RADICAN’S 6/16 NJPW Cup 2020 Night 1 report: Takahashi vs. Honma, Ishii vs. Desperado

RADICAN’S NJPW CUP 2020 NIGHT 1 RESULTS
JUNE 16, 2020
AIRED LIVE ON NJPW WORLD

This event was held in an empty arena at an unknown location.

(1) Togi Makabe beat Yota Tsuji in a First Round NJPW Cup 2020 match in 9:00. This was a solid opener. Tsuji got in a lot of offense and looked good against Makabe, but ended up taking the loss after Makabe hit a German suplex with a bridge. (**½)

(2) Toru Yano beat Jado (w/Gedo) in a First Round NJPW Cup 2020 match in 9:00. This match felt like it was never going to end even though it went 9:00. Yano’s act relies on a lot of crowd participation, but that was missing here. Jado should not be wrestling, as it appears he can barely move in the ring at this stage of his career. (-*)

(3) Suzuki-Gun (Yoshinobu Kamemaru & Zack Sabre Jr. & Minoru Suzuki & Taichi) beat Kota Ibushi & Yuya Uemura & Yuji Nagata & Hiroshi Tanahashi in an 8 Man Tag Team match in 13:30. Suzuki-Gun jumped their opponents at the bell. Tanahashi got his leg worked over by Suzuki-Gun a ton during the match. The bulk of this match was designed to build up the first round NJPW Cup match between Nagata and Suzuki the following night, as they had some great hard-hitting exchanges. Suzuki ended up hitting the Gotch Piledriver on Uemura for the win. (***½)

After the match, Ibushi was jawing with his first round opponent Zack Sabre Jr. from the outside. Ibushi ended up getting wiped out. This was a really good tag match all before NJPW went to intermission and did some sanitizing.

(4) Hiromu Takahashi beat Tomoaki Honma in a First Round NJPW Cup 2020 match in 19:00. This was a shockingly long match, especially for Honma, who has slowed down since coming back from a devastating neck injury. The first half of the match dragged a bit, but the second half was stellar. Takahashi hit a DVD on Honma on the apron that made me cringe at one point. Honoma could not get on track with his Kokeshi attacks early on, but he went on a roll with them late in the match only to miss the top rope Kokeshi. Takahashi won with the Time Bomb. (***½)

(5) Tomohiro Ishii beat El Desperado in a First Round NJPW Cup 2020 match in 20:15. This was one hell of a match. I love how NJPW booking gives everyone credibility most of the time even when a junior is matched up with a heavyweight like we had here. This probably would have been an epic match in front of a hot crowd. Desperado worked over Ishii’s leg and it paid off late in the match when Ishii went for his folding powerbomb, but his knee gave out and Desperado took a light powerbomb.

Desperado seemed on the verge of an upset. One great spot was Ishii hitting the Vertical Drop Brainbuster only for Desperado to get right back up and get obliterated with a clothesline. This got really good late and Ishii got a hard fought win with the Vertical Drop Brainbuster. (****)

Contact Sean at radicansean@pwtorch.com. Follow him on Twitter @SR_Torch.