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The last night of the Kizuna Road tour, on June 25 in Sendai, will see two British titles at stake. RPW’S Undisputed Cruiserweight Championship will be defended in Japan for the very first time, and the RevPro Undisputed Heavyweight Championship will be put on the line in the main event.
YOSHI-HASHI will be the challenger to Zack Sabre Junior in the top match on the card. ZSJ captured the gold for a record third time at Wrestle Kingdom when he defeated Tomohiro Ishii. He’s gone on to defend the title four times, most recently at Madison Square Garden when he beat Hiroshi Tanahashi and put the Ace on the shelf with an elbow injury.
In Zack’s mind, YOSHI-HASHI is a good deal beneath the British champion in all regards; still taping an injured shoulder, the Headhunter has tried again and again to be taken seriously as a challenger, only to be consistently turned away and have his injury exploited. At Dominion though, he was able to finally catch ZSJ with a pinning combination and stake his claim to the title. Can YOSHI-HASHI stay on winning form and seize UK Gold?
In the semi main event, El Phantasmo defends the British Cruiserweight Championship for the first time against Ryusuke Taguchi. ELP won the title in a brutal ladder war in the UK, ending a year long reign by David Starr just 24 hours before flying to Japan to participate in the Best of the Super Juniors.
ELP didn’t make the finals of the BOSJ; his tournament was mathematically ended, in fact, by Taguchi himself, who capitalized on Phantasmo’s hurt ankle to home in on victory. While Taguchi couldn’t win the Best of the Super Juniors, a British Cruiserweight title shot is more than consolation enough.
Also on the card, IWGP Tag Team Champions Tanga Loa and Tama Tonga will face Juice Robinson and Mikey Nicholls. Despite Guerrillas of Destiny’s win over EVIL and SANADA to retain the tag team gold at Dominion, the belts are not on the line in this one. Still, this is a chance for the still fresh combination of Robinson and Nicholls to make a tag team statement ahead of the singles oriented G1 Climax.
