New Japan continued the New Japan Cup today with the second day of Round 2 action, which would set up the second match of the Quarterfinals. There is potential for an all-United Empire section of the bracket to continue depending on what happened.
Today’s event was held at Shiga Prefectural Cultural Industry Community House Event Hall in Shiga and can be watched on demand on New Japan World.
The announced paid attendance was 789.
Match 1: Ryohei Oiwa & Ren Narita beat Oskar Leube & Tomoaki Honma. Narita beat Leube with a Figure 4.
Match 2: Shota Umino & Yuto Nakashima beat Kosei Fujita & Zack Sabre Jr. Umino beat Fujita with STF.
Match 3: David Finlay., El Phantasmo, Chase Owens & KENTA beat Taichi, Yoshinobu Kanemaru, DOUKI & TAKA Michinoku. Phantasmo pinned TAKA after Sudden Death.
Match 4: Great-O-Khan, Jeff Cobb, Mark Davis & Will Ospreay beat Dick Togo, Sho, Yujiro Takahashi & EVIL. Khan beat Togo with Subaru Sheep Killer.
Match 5: BUSHI, Hiromu Takahashi, SANADA, Shingo Takagi & Tetsuya Naito beat Lio Rush, Yoh, YOSHI-HASHI, Toru Yano & Tomohiro Ishii. Naito pinned Yano with a jackknife.
Match 6: New Japan Cup Round 2: Tama Tonga beat Aaron Henare. As a result, Tonga advances to the Quarterfinals.
Main Event: New Japan Cup Round 2: Hirooki Goto beat Kyle Fletcher. As a result, Goto advances to the Quarterfinals.
The second Quarterfinals match after today will be Tonga vs. Goto.
The next event is tomorrow at Item Ehime in Ehime with EVIL vs. Cobb and Davis vs. Ospreay in Round 2. United Empire lost 2 today but they are guaranteed to have at least one move on to the Quarterfinals via the main event. Live streaming on New Japan World will begin at 3 AM PT/6 AM ET.
UPDATE: After today’s event New Japan confirmed on Twitter the New Japan Cup winner will, as is traditionally the case, get an IWGP World Heavyweight Championship match against Kazuchika Okada at SAKURA GENESIS in April.
