Tag: chaos

The Big Takeaway —

The build towards the New Japan Cup continued as those who were scheduled to face off against one another in the opening rounds competed in a series of mystery tag team matches. The situation over the NEVER title became clearer, as Zack Sabre Jr. looks to add a fourth belt to his growing collection.

Gedo & Jado have become the favorites to get the next Junior tag team title match against new champions Taichi & Yoshinobu Kanemaru. KUSHIDA scored a pin over Hiromu Takahashi, further building a showdown between the two.

Show Recap —

Manabu Nakanishi, Hirai Kawato, Ryusuke Taguchi & David Finlay defeated Jushin Thunder Liger, Tomoyuki Oka, and IWGP Tag Team Champions Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima

Kawato jumped Liger at the bell and really gave him a beating, stomping him in the corner viciously. This was a standard, pretty solid opener with Nakanishi scoring the win with the torture rack on Oka.

Kawato and Liger stared down one another after the match, but nothing came out of it.

Yuji Nagata, Juice Robinson & Michael Elgin defeated Yujiro Takahashi, Bad Luck Fale & Tanga Loa

Juice and Yujiro, who are facing each other in the opening round of the NJPW Cup, squared off against one another, as did Elgin and Fale. It boiled down to Nagata and Loa, with Nagata drilling his NJ Cup opponent with an exploder suplex for the win. This was a nice match with some good action.

RPW British Heavyweight Champion Zack Sabre Jr., El Desperado, and IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Champions Taichi & Yoshinobu Kanemaru defeated NEVER Openweight Champion Hirooki Goto, Jado, Gedo & Trent Baretta

This was a solid match, but it was more about building programs for the NEVER and Jr. tag team titles. The heels beat up on Gedo for a while. They were building a future junior tag title bout between the new champs and Gedo & Jado.

Goto and Sabre Jr. were paired together and went at it for a bit, exchanging near falls before Sabre Jr. caught Goto in a bridge pin hold. This probably signals a future match between Goto and Sabre Jr. for the NEVER title.

Tiger Mask, Katsuyori Shibata & Togi Makabe defeated Minoru Suzuki, Taka Michinoku & Davey Boy Smith Jr.

Suzuki and Shibata brawled into the crowd early, with Suzuki getting the better of it and whacking Shibata with a steel chair. Suzuki and Shibata eventually came back in. Both teased their finishers but took each other down with multiple big boots. The crowd was really into that, and helped the match pick up over time.

Makabe and Taka Michinoku were in, and from there it didn’t last long as Makabe quickly took him down and pinned him with the King Kong Knee Drop.

Shibata and Suzuki continued to brawl as they eventually had to be separated. Suzuki pelted one of the young boys (Kitamiya) with a steel chair, causing another brawl between the two.

Kenny Omega & Tama Tonga defeated Toru Yano & Tomohiro Ishii

Yano had a near fall with a low blow on Tonga, but Omega pulled the ref out. Omega went for the knee strike, but Yano dodged and Omega fell to the floor. Tonga gave Yano a low blow of his own, then pinned him with the Gun Stun in another solid match.

KUSHIDA & Hiroshi Tanahashi defeated EVIL & IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion Hiromu Takahashi

Tanahashi jumped EVIL at the bell, which was retaliation for EVIL’s assault earlier in the day at the New Japan Cup press conference. Hiromu Takahashi and KUSHIDA worked together a lot as well, since they are the next Junior title match. They have excellent chemistry with one another and made this a good match.

EVIL laid out Tanahashi, then KUSHIDA sent EVIL packing. KUSHIDA then caught the surprise win over Takahashi with a backslide into a bridging pin.

IWGP Intercontinental Champion Tetsuya Naito, BUSHI & SANADA defeated YOSHI-HASHI, Rocky Romero & IWGP Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada

Not a spectacular main event by any means, but the action was fine and the crowd was pretty hot for everything, which helps.

BUSHI wiped out YH on the outside, leaving it between SANADA and Romero. The latter pulled off some great near falls that people got into, but the size difference was too much and Romero tapped out to the Skull End when SANADA sunk it in.

Naito cut the end of the show promo.

Final Thoughts —

There’s nothing on this show that you need to see, though everything was solid and nothing was awful.

Tonight’s Road to Show is a themed show! That’s great as these shows are usually a bunch of tag matches with or two singles. We are still getting a bunch of tags (well, three) but we’re also getting a best of five series tonight between New Japan and Bullet Club.

Toru Yano, Rocky Romero, Beretta and Tomohiro Ishii vs. Kushida, Jushin Thunder Liger, David Finlay and Tiger Mask

It was your standard NJPW eight man tag opener. Good, solid action that set the tone for the night. It was cool in that you saw some people interact with each other where it couldn’t happen under normal circumstances. For example, Liger and Ishii worked together and it was actually pretty interesting. Kushida worked with him briefly as well. That would be a very interesting match if it were ever to happen. Yano was only in there briefly, doing his usual deal with the Finlay made his comeback but RPG Vice countered. Romero took out Kushida with a dive, then they followed with the dropkick/dudebuster combo for the win.

Manabu Nakanishi, Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Satoshi Kojima and Yuji Nagata vs. Ryusuke Taguchi, Captain New Japan, Juice Robinson and Katsuyori Shibata

Why did Shibata agree to tag with Captain New Japan? Eh, I always bring this up but someone should go to management and mention CNJ’s never, like, won a match. If this were real he’d be canned a long time ago, old or not. The Old Lion Squad beat up Shibata and isolated him early. Kojima managed to thwart Taguchi’s hip attacks. It was Nagata who worked with CNJ towards the end. All of Shibata’s team mates tried to help take down Nagata but it was no use as he got the backdrop driver on CNJ and pinned him. It wasn’t that good or even interesting. Wrong team dynamics here.

Tenzan and Shibata got into a big brawl after the match, with Tenzan pelting Shibata with chairs as his team mates tried to stop him. They’re competing for the NEVER title at Invasion Attack.

Cody Hall vs. Michael Elgin

This is Hall’s first singles match in New Japan if I recall correctly. If not it’s been a very long time. He’s still green in spots but has tons of potential, has good facials and has improved dramatically in the last year. They had a short, but pretty solid back and forth match with Elgin getting the win, pinning Hall with a powerbomb pinning combination.

Jay White vs. Kenny Omega

This was pretty good. White is really good technically at this point. Crowd was kind of quiet early, but got into it towards the end, especially when White was making his comeback and was getting all the close submissions/near falls. Omega cut him off with a snap German suplex then a knee strike, pinning White to even things up.

Yujiro Takahashi vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi

Yujiro seems to not even have Mao or his cool theme song anymore at this point. He just came out to the usual Bullet Club theme. Tanahashi came out but Yujiro jumped him immediately. This was fine – short, but was probably the right amount of length. Yujiro low blowed him at one point and got a near fall with a cradle. Yujiro bumped into the referee towards the end of the match, and Tanahashi returned the favor. He gave him the sling blade, high fly flow, boom, there’s your winner.

Tomoaki Honma vs. Bad Luck Fale

I liked this match in the sense it told a nice story. People were into Honma’s comebacks and were totally behind him. Honma fought hard early but Fale took him to town and dominated, as he’s the big giant of the promotion. Fale beat him up forever and ever until he escaped the Bad Luck Fall and scored a roll up for a nearfall. Fale gave him a GIGANTIC lariat in retaliation, then pinned him with the Bad Luck Fall.

Tama Tonga vs. Togi Makabe

This is the deciding match in the best of five series as they’re tied with two wins each. This wasn’t really anything interesting. Not terrible, but I couldn’t get into it. Just a lot of back and forth brawling with no real significant heat. Tonga did do a ref spot and a gun stun at one point. Makabe fought him off, hit the spider German suplex and was going for the King Kong knee drop when Tonga Roa came in and shoved him off the top rope, then continued beating him for the DQ. So technically, the New Japan guys win the best of five battle.

Roa and Tonga beat up on Makabe (Honma was destroyed in the previous match) as young lions try to intervene, but Roa throws them around easily. They laid out Makabe one more time with a modified double team version of Tonga’s finish (waistlock DDT). Tonga cut a promo saying they are GOD – Guerillas of Destruction. Cool name. Don’t know if this team will work, but we’ll see. It’s something new at the very least.

Evil, Tetsuya Naito & Bushi vs. Hirooki Goto, Kazuchika Okada & Yoshi-Hashi

Ingobernables were mean early with Bushi choking out Yoshi-Hashi and Naito beating up Gedo all the way back to the backstage area. What’s funny here is that now Crowd were into Goto as opposed to booing him, I guess because he finally joined Chaos. He and Evil worked pretty good together. Okada and Naito had some good back and forth before he tagged in Yoshi-Hashi. He made a good comeback and battled out of the Destino and walloped Naito with a lariat. There was another ref spot. That’s like three matches tonight where there’s been some sort of ref bump, pretty excessive and unnecessary. This allowed the heels to lay everyone out and pin Yoshi-Hashi for the win.

NJPW 45th Anniversary show results: LIJ vs. Chaos six-man main event