Dalton Smith will headline Matchroom Boxing's 2025 launch show.

The unbeaten junior welterweight is set to face France's Walid Ouizza atop a Jan. 25 DAZN card from Motorpoint Arena in Nottingham, England. Matchroom announced the event on Saturday, revealing five more events with more to come in a busy first quarter for the Brentwood, Essex-headquartered company.

Smith-Ouizza will come with the vacant European (EBU) junior welterweight title at stake. The show will be packaged as part of a bicontinental doubleheader. Later that evening—as previously reported by The Ring—Diego Pacheco (22-0, 18 KOs; No. 4 at 168 by The Ring) and Steve Nelson meet in a battle of unbeaten super middleweights in Las Vegas.

“This is how you get things started.," said Eddie Hearn, Matchroom Sport chairman. “2025 is guaranteed to be our biggest year yet – and it’s all exclusive to fight fans on the global home of Boxing, DAZN. Going back-to-back on January 25 underlines our strength worldwide with two incredible shows."

Sheffield's Smith (16-0, 12 KOs) will end a career-long ten-month ring absence with the bout. He was previously due to fight in September but withdrew due to injury which left him sidelined for the balance of 2024.

His lone fight on the year was a fifth-round knockout of Jose Zepeda (38-5, 29 KOs) on March 16 in his Sheffield hometown.

Ouizza (19-2, 8 KOs) fights outside of France for just the second time in his career. He does carry a twelve-fight win streak, though—like Smith—he fought just once during this calendar year.

The evening's co-feature will see The Ring/IBF junior featherweight championship Ellie Scotney (9-0, 0 KOs) risks her crown against Australia's Mea Motu (22-0, 8 KOs).

Scotney became The Ring's first-ever women's junior featherweight with a ten-round win over unbeaten WBO titlist Segolene Lefebvre (18-0 at the time) on April 13 in Manchester, England.

Motu enters her first major title fight, though she's also won and held the IBO 122-pound title. The 34-year-old is currently rated No. 5 at 130 by The Ring but returns to her natural weight division for this opportunity.

Also on the show: