Japanese southpaw Shingo Wake and Jonathan Guzman of the Dominican Republic will fight for the IBF super bantamweight title recently vacated by Carl Frampton.

The pair, who were both linked to ‘The Jackal’ in recent years – Wake more so than Guzman as he was mandatory for the strap – will trade leather for a title Frampton won by defeating Kiko Martinez back in September of 2014 and defended successfully three times since against Chris Avalos, Alejandro Gonzalez Jr, and Scott Quigg.

The undefeated Belfast boxer now takes a step up in weight and onto a bigger stage as he fights three weight World champ Leo Santa Cruz for the WBA featherweight strap in New York at the Barclay’s Centre on July 30th. As a result his IBF strap has become vacant opening the door for Wake and Guzman to fight for it on July 20th at Edion Arena in Osaka, Japan.

Wake became a mandatory challenger by virtue of his unanimous decision win against Mike Tawatchai in their title eliminator last June in Tokyo.

The heavy-handed Guzman, 26, knocked out Daniel Rosas in the eighth round on April 29th in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in a title eliminator and has won all 21 of his bouts by stoppage.