DESTRUCTION, New Japan’s annual fall Kobe blowout event, is now in the books.
Today’s event was held at Kobe World Hall in Kobe and can be watched on demand OUTSIDE JAPAN ONLY on New Japan World. This event aired in Japan as part of WORLD PRO WRESTLING LIVE 2024 on TV Asahi.
The announced paid attendance was 4528, a full house/near sellout.
Match 1: Dragon Dia (Dragon Gate), Ryusuke Taguchi & Shota Umino beat Tiger Mask, Tomoaki Honma & Yuji Nagata. Umino pinned Honma after Death Rider.
Match 2: BUSHI, Hiromu Takahashi & Yota Tsuji beat Francesco Akira, Callum Newman & Jeff Cobb. Takahashi beat Akira with a Figure 4.
Match 3: Hirooki Goto vs. Gabriel Kidd went to a double countout. Which led to…
Match 3 (again): In a No DQ match, Hirooki Goto beat Gabriel Kidd.
Match 4: Kosei Fujita, Zack Sabre Jr. & TBA, revealed at match time to be the returning Ryohei Oiwa, beat TAKA Michinoku, Taichi & SANADA. Oiwa pinned TAKA after THE GRIP (sleeper hold into a rolling lariat). This was Oiwa’s return match after finishing up his training excursion in Pro Wrestling NOAH, and it appears he is joining TMDK.
Match 5: NEVER 6-Man Tag Team Champions Boltin Oleg, Toru Yano & Hiroshi Tanahashi beat Sho, Yujiro Takahashi & EVIL to retain the titles. Tanahashi pinned Takahashi after High Fly Flow. V2 for the champs.
Match 6: IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion DOUKI beat Yoshinobu Kanemaru to retain the title. V2 for DOUKI. Next up: Possibly Sho, who laid out DOUKI afterwards.
Match 7: Shingo Takagi beat NEVER Openweight Champion HENARE to win the title. Takagi becomes the 46th NEVER Openweight Champion.
Match 8: IWGP Global Champion David Finlay beat YOSHI-HASHI to retain the title.V2 for Finlay. Next up: TBA but post-match happenings hint at possibly Goto.
Main Event: IWGP World Heavyweight Champion Tetsuya Naito beat Great-O-Khan to retain the title. V1 for Naito. They went 30+ minutes. Next up: Sabre. As previously announced, that match will happen on 10/14 at Ryogoku Kokugikan in Tokyo.
The next event is Saturday at Kumagaya CIty Municipal Gym in Saitama to start the Road To KING OF PRO WRESTLING 2024 Tour. There will be no live or on demand broadcast. In fact, unless plans change last-minute the entire tour will be non-televised (5 events between Saitama, Shizuoka, Ibaraki and Nagano). They’ll make up for it by broadcasting the entire next tour in part because it will have a tournament.
