The second night of New Japan’s 20th Wrestling Dontaku event was Mon., May 4 in Fukuoka, as those who read Mr Ares’ excellent New Japan previews in The Feed already know. Sunday’s Night One closed with Andrade El Ídolo taking the IWGP Global title from Yota Tsuji, and more AEW or multi-promotional talents were featured in big matches on Monday.
In the main card’s first match, Konosuke Takeshita successfully retained his New Japan TV title over Chase Owens. But then the lights went out on The Alpha,
and a video played showing a masked figure who’d been teased at Sakura Genesis walking around backstage. The figure appeared behind Takeshita, taking him out, and revealing himself to be former IWGP World champ SANADA, who took a leave of absence after hinting at a departure during this year’s New Year’s shows.
The faction-jumping SANADA left Takeshita laying, and left with the TV title in a bag.
TMDK’s Ichiban Sweet Boys weren’t even supposed to be defending their IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag titles, but Robbie Eagles accepted a challenge from Mistico after their eight-man on Night One. Teaming with El Desperado, the legendary luchador (who just signed his own AEW contract in addition to his CMLL one) won a New Japan belt for the first time since winning the Junior Heavyweight singles belt back in 2009.
That was the first of three title matches to close the show. Callum Newman retained his IWGP World title over Shingo Takagi in the main event… but more on that in a bit. Before that, Will Ospreay teamed with his fellow United Empire originals Great-O-Khan and HENARE to go for the NEVER 6-man championship. Bruv wasn’t holding back against Bishimon’s Hirooki Goto & YOSHI-HASHI and their teammate Oleg Boltin:
Ospreay eventually got the pin on YOSHI-HASHI after an assisted Hidden Blade, and the Aerial Assassin was once again a New Japan titleholder. It seems he may have his sights set on a bigger IWGP prize, however.
In the aftermath of Newman’s win over Takagi, Yota Tsuji tried to help his Unbound Company teammate when United Empire joined the champ in the ring. Newman took our Tsuji, but Ospreay stopped him from doing the same to Shingo. He was eventually bullied into it by his former protege though — then seemed to be eyeing Newman’s prize in the aftermath…
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DRAMA!
Here all the results from Night Two:
- Kickoff Match: Masatora Yasuda def. Taisei Nakahara
- NJPW World Television Championship: Konosuke Takeshita (c) def. Chase Owens
- Unbound Company (Daiki Nagai & Gedo) def. Tatsuya Matsumoto & Ryusuke Taguchi
- Knock Out Brothers (OSKAR & Yuto-Ice) def. Tomoaki Honma & Shota Umino
- Hontai (Master Wato, YOH, Tiger Mask, Toru Yano & Aaron Wolf) def. House of Torture (Yoshinobu Kanemaru, SHO, Yujiro Takahashi, Don Fale & Ren Narita)
- Taichi & Yuya Uemura def. T.M.D.K. (Hartley Jackson & Ryohei Oiwa)
- Unbound Company (Robbie X, Taiji Ishimori, Drilla Moloney & Yota Tsuji) def. United Empire (Zane Jay, Jakob Austin Young, Francesco Akira & Jake Lee)
- IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championship: Místico & El Desperado def. TMDK (Kosei Fujita & Robbie Eagles) (c)
- NEVER Openweight 6-Man Tag Team Championship: United Empire (Great-O-Khan, HENARE & Will Ospreay) def. Oleg Boltin, YOSHI-HASHI & Hirooki Goto (c)
- IWGP Heavyweight Championship: Callum Newman (c) def. Shingo Takagi
Excited for a United Empire civil war? Thoughts on an eventful Wrestling Dontaku, and what it means for AEW, NJPW, CMLL and their alliance as we head to Forbidden Door? Share them in the comments below!
