Former Oriental and Pacific Boxing Federation lightweight champion Masayoshi Nakatani of Teiken Boxing Gym announced his retirement from boxing in his social networking service on May 29.

  The 34-year-old Nakatani, who made his professional debut in 2011 after a long amateur career, thanked his fans for their support in his Twitter.

  Nakatani, who stands 182 cm, captured the OPBF title in 2014 after making a professional debut in 2011 and successfully defended the title 11 times.

  While he lost to Teofimo Lopez of the United States in July 2019 in an elimination fight for the International Boxing Federation lightweight championship fight, Nakatani stopped Felix Verdejo of Puerto Rico in December 2020, which made it possible for Nakatani to face Vasyl Lomachenko of Ukraine, a former world lightweight champion of three sanctioning bodies. But Nakatani was stopped in the ninth round.

  Nakatani suffered a sixth-round technical knockout loss to champion Shuichiro Yoshino of Misako Boxing Gym in the World Boxing Organization’s Asia-Pacific lightweight title fight last November. It was Nakatani’s first loss in Japan, which proved to be his last fight.

  Nakatani has a lifetime record of 20 wins, including 14 KOs, against three losses.