New Japan continued the Road To DESTRUCTION Tour today with another event in Tokyo.
Today’s event was held at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo and can be watched on demand on New Japan World. This was a Samurai! TV broadcast in Japan.
The announced paid attendance was 1190.
Pre-show match: Ryusuke Taguchi & Yuji Nagata beat Combatants N & Y. Taguchi beat N with Oh My & Gar Ankle. This was a collaboration match with a stage/theater show starting this week in Japan that El Desperado is part of.
Match 1; Jacob Austin Young beat Shoma Kato.
Match 2; Kosei Fujita & Zack Sabre Jr. beat Katsuya Murashima & Hiroyoshi Tenzan. Fujita beat Murashima with Clarky Cat.
Match 3; Sho & Ren Narita beat Jado & Shota Umino. Sho beat Jado with a kneebar.
Match 4: Jake Lee & Gabriel Kidd beat Tomoaki Honma & Tomohiro Ishii. Kidd pinned Honma after O-KNEE.
Match 5: Yoshinobu Kanemaru, Dick Togo, Yujiro Takahashi & EVIL beat Tiger Mask, Boltin Oleg, Toru Yano & Hiroshi Tanahashi. Kanemaru beat TM 4 with a Figure 4.
Match 6: TAKA Michinoku & DOUKI beat Gedo & Taiji Ishimori. TAKA beat Gedo with Just Facelock.
Match 7: Francesco Akira, Callum Newman, Jeff Cobb & Great-O-Khan beat BUSHI, Shingo Takagi, Yota Tsuji & Tetsuya Naito. Khan pinned BUSHI after Eliminator.
Main Event: NEVER Openweight Champion HENARE beat Hiromu Takahashi to retain the title. V1 for HENARE. Next up: Takagi. That match will likely happen on 9/29 at DESTRUCTION. Not official yet.
The tour-ender for this portion of the tour is Wednesday at Sendai Sun Plaze in Sendai with an IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship main event. Live streaming on New Japan World will begin at 2:30 AM PT/5:30 AM ET. After this event the rest of the tour will be in Hokkaido with only the first event being broadcast (the rest are non-televised events) so unless plans change, no New Japan World for 2 weeks.
UPDATE: A 10 bell salute will be held before Wednesday’s event in memory of Kuniaki Kobayashi, who died today at 68. He was the manager of the New Japan Dojo and wrestled for New Japan and All-Japan from 1972 until 2000. He was a former IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion and All-Japan World Junior Heavyweight Champion.
