Shakur Confirms Interest in Fighting Inoue

In an interview with the YouTube channel Punsh Drunk Boxing, the WBC lightweight champion (up to 135 lbs), Shakur Stevenson (21-0, 10 KOs), expressed his willingness to step into the ring against the undisputed super bantamweight champion (up to 55,2 kg), Naoya Inoue (26-0, 23 KOs), if the Japanese fighter moves up to lightweight.

In his last fight in November of the previous year for the vacant WBC lightweight belt against Edwin De Los Santos (16-2, 14 KOs), Shakur won by unanimous decision. In December, Naoya Inoue knocked out Marlon Tapales (37-4, 19 KOs) in the 10th round.

Recently, Inoue commented, assuring that he does not plan to change weight classes this year, and possibly not the next year either:

"My move to featherweight (up to 57,1 kg) will depend on how I and my body feel next year. I always want to present the best version of myself.

I wouldn't fight in featherweight or super featherweight just because there are good sums offered. That's not what I want. Many fighters have chased the money, but didn't deliver good results and left boxing. There's a reason weight classes exist in boxing," Inoue told RingTV.