The January 24 fight in Tokyo had already been rescheduled from its original Christmas Eve date after Goodman was injured in sparring in December.
Japanese media said the unbeaten Inoue was now looking for another opponent after Goodman’s promoters No Limit Boxing announced their fighter could not compete.
“No Limit Boxing regrets to announce that Sam Goodman has been forced to withdraw from his scheduled bout against Naoya Inoue on January 24 due to a recurrence of his eye injury,” the promoters said in a statement.
“We wish Sam a full and speedy recovery and will provide updates on the event in due course.”
The 26-year-old Goodman originally hurt his left eye during his final training session before jetting to Japan, the Australian’s promoter and his manager told Sydney’s Daily Telegraph.
Goodman, the mandatory challenger for Inoue’s WBO and IBF titles, needed four stitches and was told he could not fight for four weeks, the newspaper said.
Inoue, who has a 28-0 record with 25 knockouts, beat Ireland’s TJ Doheny in his most recent defence in Tokyo in September.
Inoue was due to defend his super-bantamweight titles for the third time since becoming undisputed champion in December last year.
He is just the second man to become undisputed world champion at two different weights since the four-belt era began in 2004. American Terence Crawford was the first.
© 2025 AFP