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MAR.19.2020

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The Week that Was in NJPW World History (March 14-20)

The 2020 New Japan Cup may have been taken off the schedule, but we have past Cup matches, and other classics from mid March in the past to bring you from the extensive NJPW World archives!

 

March 15, 2015: Golden Cup

2015 had started with a loss for Kota Ibushi, opposite Shinsuke Nakamura at Wrestle Kingdom 9, but it was the first step in an explosive early part to the year. An intense period for the Golden Star had seem him return from an injury that had cost him the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship and much of the summer of 2014, only to turn heavyweight, all while wrestling with dual NJPW and DDT contracts. Resetting after the Tokyo Dome however, Ibushi set his sights on the New Japan Cup.

Driven to become the first since the tournament’s inception to win on his first try, Ibushi would get past both Toru Yano and Doc Gallows, to face Tetsuya Naito and Hirooki Goto in the same night in Sendai. Naito, a contemporary and friend (at the time) of Ibushi’s, was seeking his own means to reset, while dealing with rejection from crowds and disappointment in the win:loss column. In a phenomenal semi-final however, Ibushi emerged on top; he then had to contend with three time winner Goto. 

Goto had no easy path to his fifth NJC final, having to contend with Yuji Nagata and best friend Katsuyori Shibata en route to Sendai, and then putting Togi Makabe away in eight hard hitting minutes before the main event. Goto had the edge in tournament experience, but the drive of the Golden Star was ultimately unbeatable.

Relive the match here!

March 16, 2019: Ace versus A***

The 2019 New Japan Cup was full of surprises, and some surprising tests for Hiroshi Tanahashi. Though both Yujiro Takahashi and David Finlay were forced out of the 32 man field due to respective injuries, Shota Umino and Ryusuke Taguchi found themselves in the tournament. The Young Lion Umino gave Tanahashi an awful lot more to deal with than he may have expected, putting in a phenomenally stirring first round effort before being squeezed out. 

In round two in Korakuen then, the Iron Will of the ace had to face the iron glutes of the Funky Weapon. This wasn’t to be Taguchi’s first meeting against Tanahashi, nor his first in the New Japan Cup, as the two had faced off in 2008. It wasn’t just the chance to headline in Madison Square Garden at stake for Taguchi here, but also to better his 69th IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship reign by becoming the 69th IWGP Heavyweight Champion at G1 Supercard. Could the stars align in Korakuen Hall?

Relive the match here!

 

March 19 2017: Bite meets fight

The true fighting spirit of a man. That’s what Katsuyori Shibata vowed to show in the 2017 New Japan Cup, and that was borne out in his campaign. With a tough draw of Minoru Suzuki in the first round, Shibata was able to move past the King, and, days later, Juice Robinson as well. 

His semi-final opponent was a man he knew very well. When he and Tomohiro Ishii first met during the 2013 G1 Climax, the fireworks were instant, and extremely explosive. Intense G1 bouts joined extremely physical wars over the NEVER Openweight Championship in the coming years, creating one of NJPW’s hardest hitting and most vicious of rivalries. There was mutual respect between the Stone Pitbull and the Wrestler, but all that would go out of the window when the bell rang, and the two bulls charged at one another with predictably violent results.

Relive the match here!

March 20, 1997: Just Mu’s Side Are You On?

In 1997, the biggest war in professional wrestling was being fought on both sides of the Pacific Ocean, with the New World Order its antagonists. The nWo formed in 1996 in WCW and immediately made a huge impact, before Masahiro Chono, already an outcast from the core of New Japan Pro-Wrestling and playing by his own rules in the Okami Gundan stable, found a common philosophy in the white and black. 

nWo Japan ran roughshod into 1997, and NJPW and WCW would do all they could to fight back. In Aichi, that led to a five on five elimination tag bout, combining Japanese and American forces on both sides of the fence. For the nWo, Chono would be joined by fellow nWo Japan founding member Hiroyoshi Tenzan, and from the States, Scott Norton, ‘Buff’ Bagwell and the nWo’s fake ‘Sting’.

In the opposite corner was quite the team indeed. IWGP heavyweight Champion Shinya Hashimoto was joined by a man he’d defended his gold against two years prior: Lord Steven Regal. Kensuke Sasaki, who would experience a momentous rise in ’97 was also on the NJPW/WCW side, as was Manabu Nakanishi, who, on excursion in the US at the time, was actually representing WCW. 

The biggest question mark lingered around Keiji Muto, however. The nWo, and Chono in particular had been uncharacteristically sportsmanlike when Muto was involved, something many assumed was part of a recruitment effort. Questions and rumours circled around Muto and whether he was entirely committed to the NJPW cause; indeed he would be first eliminated after hesitating on a sure fire Moonsault pinfall in the early going. Moments later, his enigmatic alter-ego The Great Muta emerged, to dramatic effect…

Relive the match here!

 

 

 

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