For five rounds, Portlaoise native TJ Doheny was in the fight, holding his own against Naoya Inoue in a spirited bid for the Japanese superstar’s undisputed super bantamweight title at the Ariake Arena in Tokyo last Tuesday. Then Inoue stepped it up in the sixth stanza, and 16 seconds into the seventh, it was all over.
Doheny, IBF super bantamweight champion between 2018 and 2019, suffered his first loss in five outings to Japan and saw his record drop to 26-5 [20 KOs].
Dubbed “The Monster” for his power, the undefeated Inoue upped his ledger to 28-0 with the 25th KO of his career. A four-division world champion, he earned his ninth consecutive stoppage and became the first man to halt Doheny.
Still, it wasn’t easy. Doheny, at 37, six years Inoue’s senior, brought all his experience to bear in the scheduled 12-rounder, drawing the champion into a cautious and tactical contest early on before 15,000 fans.
There were the feints, the movement and body shots as Doheny sought openings. He produced some nice work in the third round – although most of his head shots were blocked while his body shots landed consistently.
It got better for the Irish challenger in the fourth – his most successful round in terms of connects to the head. At one time, Doheny landed three left hands, including one that snapped Inoue’s head back.
There were several good exchanges in the fifth stanza, in which both men had good luck with body and head shots.
And then Inoue, who's widely acknowledged among prizefighting’s best, pound-for-pound, stepped it up a notch. It might have been a case of the older man slowing down or the champion simply deciding that it was time to shift gears.
But the outcome was a big sixth round in which, for the first time, Doheny took a sustained beating.
At the bell, the challenger went to his corner complaining of a pain in the hip area. Whatever the problem was, it was exacerbated at the start of the seventh when Inoue quickly jumped on him. There were two straight rights by the Japanese followed by a rapid four-punch combination with Doheny on the ropes.
Doheny came off the ropes, his right glove touching his back and right leg dragging. He took a knee and it was over.
“It’s the muscle right above my hip,” he later explained in his dressing room. “I just [couldn’t] use my right leg.”
Inoue attributed it to all the punishment the challenger took. “I think it was an accumulation,” he said, “I want to thank TJ Doheny for all that he has done in his career.”
