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John Pollock and Wai Ting review NJPW’s New Beginning in Nagoya showheadlined by Shingo Takagi vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi in a must-see NEVER Openweight Championship match.
The show also features rare stipulation singles bouts featuring Tencozy members Satoshi Kojima and Hiroyoshi Tenzan against United Empire’s Will Ospreay and Great-O-Khan.
We also discuss Jon Moxley’s surprise return to New Japan on last night’s edition of NJPW Strong.
NJPW New Beginning in Nagoya January 30, 2021 Aichi Aichi Prefectural Gymnasium (Dolphin’s Arena)
NEVER Openweight Championship: Shingo Takagi (c) vs Hiroshi Tanahashi
No DQ Match: Satoshi Kojima vs Will Ospreay
Loser Must Give Up the Mongolian Chop: Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs Great-O-Khan
Master Wato, SHO, Tomoaki Honma & Kota Ibushi vs BUSHI, Hiromu Takahashi, Tetsuya Naito & SANADA
Toru Yano & Kazuchika Okada vs Yujiro Takahashi & EVIL
About to take a drive and listen to the recap, but man was that an amazing showing by Shingo and Tanahashi. It’s such a weird juxtaposition between how they’ve booked Tana over the last year as an old man who can’t win and how he literally never fails to live up to the moment in any big solo match he’s in otherwise. This one definitely goes in the early runnings for best of the year. It would seem coming out of this that Shingo immediately becomes an equal favorite to Ospreay in the New Japan Cup. Either one of those options coming out will make for a great next contender for Ibushi.
Speaking of older men, what an interesting year for Kojima - had the one great post-shutdown EVIL match of the year in the Cup, got a singles match at the Dome, and now this morning with a fun match with Ospreay that shows enough juice is left in him to do wonders for others. That Ospreay fall through the ladder was a beauty.
I continue to like O’Khan a lot and enjoy their booking of him so far (doesn’t it feel like a month with Tenzan has given GOK more than 8 months with Tenzan has given Wato?). What a nice way to garner heat like a move that’ll remind people in each of his matches of what he stole from a legend. Might be good idea for other companies to borrow when an older wrestler can’t do a move anymore - Lashley beats Goldberg for the right to the Jackhammer. Or MJF beats Jericho for the right to the Lionsault. Anyway, New Japan is constantly in need of top-level heels, especially now with White/KENTA being absent from the main show and Suzuki-gun having become tweeners; the United Empire seems to all be fitting in nicely in that end in such a short time.
