The card for Kizuna Road itself isn’t all that interesting, though we do have a unique match in Will Ospreay and Okada teaming up to take on Naito and Bushi in the main event. The real interest will be during the intermission, in which the participants for the G1 will be announced, and the big matches on the tour will be highlighted as well. Will Tanahashi make the cut? Who gets left out? Will Yujiro still somehow maintain a spot? We’ll find out soon enough!

David Finlay vs. Ryusuke Taguchi

About as solid of a match as you’d expect from these two. Taguchi looked good, as did David, who is now sporting a beard. He lost here to the dodon by Taguchi.

Rocky Romero, Trent Baretta, Tomohiro Ishii and Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Jushin Liger, Tiger Mask, Captain New Japan and Manabu Nakanishi

Nakanishi has a new shirt that says Monster Morning, because he has a really big breakfast. No, really, he posts his breakfast like every day on Twitter. Captain New Japan demanded for Sakuraba to get in there. Sakuraba wasn’t interested. Eventually he relented but CNJ ran to Liger for protection. A lot of comedy stuff to start out with- Baretta wanted to shake Liger’s hand. Liger, who is probably aware by now the handshake spot almost always leads to the dumb babyface getting jumped, had no interest.

Baretta went around shaking everyone’s hand (including a member of the audience) until Liger finally relented. This time, however, Liger caught Baretta trying to lay him out and instead took him out. Basic eight man tag with with pretty fun spots. CNJ and Sakuraba did have another confrontation towards the end, with the latter getting the upper hand. Ishii’s the one to get the win, pinning CNJ with the brainbuster.

Hangman Page, Chase Owens and Yujiro Takahashi vs. Satoshi Kojima, Yoshitatsu and Matt Sydal

Heels jumped faces before the bell rang. Everyone looked good here, as it was an  action packed six man tag. Page and Sydal worked together and aside from one noticeable botch they worked pretty well with one another. Kojima made the hot tag, took out Yujiro who was interfering, and pinned Owens with the lariat.

Bullet Club didn’t like that too much, so they jumped the faces after the match and hanged Yoshitatsu. Given he was out for over a year with severe neck injuries I’m pretty sure they could have put someone else in this spot.

Here we are: G1 time!
A Block: Togi Makabe, Satoshi Kojima, Tomohiro Ishii, Hirooki Goto, Bad Luck Fale, Tama Tonga, Sanada, Naomichi Marufuji, Kazuchika Okada, Hiroshi Tanahashi
B Block: Katsuyori Shibata, Yuji Nagata, Tomoaki Honma, Michael Elgin, Toru Yano, Tetsuya Naito, Evil, Kenny Omega, Yoshi-Hashi, Katsuhiko Nakajima

Big matches:

7/18: Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Sanada, Okada vs. Marufuji
7/22: Nagata vs. Naito, Shibata vs. Honma
7/23: Tanahashi vs. Makabe, Okada vs. Sanada
7/24: Nakajima vs. Shibata, Honma vs. Yoshi-Hashi
7/25: Makabe vs. Sanada, Okada vs. Goto
7/27: Yano vs. Naito, Shibata vs. Elgin
7/28: Ishii vs. Marufuji, Goto vs. Sanada
7/30: Omega vs. Elgin, Shibata vs. Naito
7/31: Makabe vs. Marufuji, Tanahashi vs. Goto
8/1: Yoshi Hashi vs. Nakajima, Honma vs. Naito
8/3: Tanahashi vs. Ishii, Makabe vs. Okada
8/4: Nakajima vs. Naito, Shibata vs. Omega
8/6: Tanahashi vs. Marufuji, Okada vs. Ishii
8/7: Omega vs. Nagata, Naito vs. Evil
8/8: Ishii vs. Sanada, Tanahashi vs. Kojima
8/10: Honma vs. Elgin, Shibata vs. Nagata
8/12: Goto vs. Marufuji, Tanahashi vs. Okada
8/13: Shibata vs. Evil, Naito vs. Omega

Additionally, all shows will be airing live on New Japan World.

Yuji Nagata, Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Tomoaki Honma vs. Juice Robinson, Togi Makabe and Katsuyori Shibata

Good match, fast paced and solid throughout. Honma and Shibata, who are in the same block and are also facing off soon over the NEVER title, worked against one another for a lot of the match. Tenzan, who is not in the G1 this year, seemed particularly motivated in this match. He got the win with the moonsault, pinning Robinson. I guess that’ll stick it to those in charge.

Shibata and Honma had to be separated after the match. Tenzan cut a short promo once that was all settled, wondering why he wasn’t in the G1.

Evil and Sanada vs. Hirooki Goto and Yoshi-Hashi

Really great match, easily the best of the night in terms of heat. This was all about Yoshi-Hashi and Sanada as they’ve been feuding for the last month.This got a lot of great heat towards the end as Yoshi-Hashi got a submission in on Sanada and nearly tapped him out. They had a really good back and forth exchanged towards the end. Yoshi-Hashi is ready in terms of being a big breakout singles star. They’ve kept him in tags for years and it’s time to go beyond that. Sanada is going to excel here and in the G1. Evil flattened him with a lariat but Yoshi-Hashi kicked out. They did several more great near falls that people were super into. Finally Sanada went for the Skull End once again but Yoshi Hashi slipped to the ground and rolled up Sanada for the flash pin.

Kazuchika Okada and Will Ospreay vs. Tetsuya Naito and Bushi

Since Naito didn’t have Milano Collection AT or any announcers to bully, he opted to lay out the camera guy instead. Pretty good main event overall. It couldn’t match the previous bout, but people were still very much into it. This crowed loved Naito and there were huge changes for him throughout the match. Ospreay came in for fun great highspots including a tornillo dive to the outside. He hit a spanish fly on Bushi, then a spinning kick but missed the springboard cutter and ate a Canadian destroyer by Bushi. Okada broke up that fall, but Bushi came back and hit the codebreaker for the win.

Bushi cuts a promo and asks why he isn’t in the Super J Cup. Naito says yes, those are the two big events of the summer…but until then, tranquilo.

Good show, and very newsworthy to boot. Definitely check out the co-main as it has some awesome heat and action.