10 Things I Learned From The 2016 NJPW G1 Climax

10. A New Generation Of Stars Are Here

The 2016 G1 Climax was the most unpredictable yet. The first night saw both Hiroshi Tanahashi and Kazuchika Okada come up short against tough but beatable opponents, the former tapping out to SANADA and the latter being simply outclassed by Naomichi Marufuji. The shocks continued on night two, as YOSHI-HASHI pinned Kenny Omega and Tomoaki Honma pinned NEVER Openweight Champion Katsuyori Shibata.

Throughout the entire tournament, the lower mid card of New Japan Pro Wrestling had performance and results that have truly put them on the map. It is clear to all now that SANADA is destined to be the face of the company, and his wins over Tanahashi and Tomohiro Ishii were surprising only because they weren’t.

YOSHI-HASHI finally put together a series of performances the likes of which we knew he was capable of. EVIL defeated both Shibata and the IWGP Intercontinental Champion, and the future is very bright for the King of Darkness.

Finally, Tama Tonga managed to win the crowd back over despite a slow start and the memory of his G.O.D run. The son of Haku even picked up a shocking win against Tanahashi, and rounded off his tournament with a pinfall victory over stablemate Bad Luck Fale.

The future is very bright for New Japan Pro Wrestling.

Authored by John Bills

Contributor

Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.

Posted On: 16th Aug 2016

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