Everything You Need To Know About The NJPW G1 Climax
7. Who Won't Win Block A?
The names have been announced for both blocks, and as with every wrestling tournament it is quite easy to separate the competitors into those who could win the whole thing and those who have no chance at all. Block A is considered to be the block with more star-power, but there are still six or seven men who have zero chance of winning this block.
Togi Makabe and Satoshi Kojima are both grizzled veterans, and are both former winners of the tournament, doing so in 2009 and 2010 respectively. They are here for name value and will most likely end the tournament with just a handful of wins to their name. This isn't a reason to skip their matches, though, as both are still more than capable of pulling something special out of the hat.
On the other end of the experience scale we have SANADA, one of the newest members of the Los Ingobernables de Japon faction. He came in and immediately had matches with Okada, but has now settled into a midcard feud with YOSHI-HASHI. SANADA might surprise one or two, but he won't win the block.
Surely it is beyond Hirooki Goto and Tomohiro Ishii too. Goto is a former winner of the tournament, but is famed for his inability to win 'the big one', so to speak. Ishii has gained a huge amount of popularity in the last couple of years on the back of some of the stiffest matches imaginable. Neither man will win the block, but their one-on-one bout might just steal the whole tournament.
The Bullet Club duo of Tama Tonga and Bad Luck Fale also have no chance of winning Block A. It is good to see Tama in the tournament however, and hopefully he can regain some of the momentum lost teaming with brother in recent months. Fale? He'll be big and slow and boring, but he'll probably beat Okada or Tanahashi.