Vasiliy Lomachenko can’t wait to get back into the ring after losing all his belts to Teofimo Lopez in October 2020. He will get his wish on Saturday, as he looks to return to his winning ways when he takes on Japanese contender Masayoshi Nakatani in a lightweight fight at Virgin Hotels Las Vegas. 

Nakatani is not someone many boxing analysts would dismiss as mere free lunch for Lomachenko. He’s got a 19-1-0 record with 13 knockouts, with his only loss coming at the hands of Lopez in July of 2019.

Coming off a loss, Vasiliy Lomachenko (14-2-0) could have gone a different path and looked for a less dangerous foe than Nakatani, but the Ukrainian is not interested in taking an easy route.                                                

Via Jake Donovan of Boxing Scene:

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“What inspired me to take this fight is the fact that I just lost all of my titles,” Lomachenko told BoxingScene.com. “I have to start from scratch and wanted to face a top contender.

Although relatively unknown to casual boxing fans, Nakatani projects to be a more dangerous fighter than his odds project. Nakatani, who is a +700 underdog opposite Lomachenko (+1400), is coming off a huge upset win over Felix Verdejo last December.

In that fight, Nakatani got knocked down in the first round then again in the fourth coming back to score a surprising knockout in the ninth round and take the vacant WBO Inter-Continental Lightweight title.