Cero Reviews NJPW G1 Climax 31, 10.8

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Cero Reviews NJPW G1 Climax 31, 10.8

Post by cero2k » Oct 12th, '21, 13:28

NJPW G1 Climax 31, Day 12
October 8, 2021
Kochi Prefectural Gymnasium, Kochi, Japan

El Desperado vs. Kosei Fujita - 6/10
Another good Young Lion match, it was mostly grounded with Despy trying to submit Fujita, and Fujita having a couple of hope spots. Despy won by submission. While I still think Oiwa has the better look and biggest chance at becoming a top babyface wrestler, I feel Fujita is a better wrestler right now, better selling better energy.

G1 Climax 2021 Block B Match
YOSHI-HASHI [2] vs. Tama Tonga [4] (w/Jado) - 7/10
First couple of minutes were good, but it got really good at the end. Tama Tonga worked over YH for most of the match, but once YH made a comeback and started countering Tonga's offense, the match picked up a lot, and it ended with YH making a complete comeback until he got the win.

G1 Climax 2021 Block B Match
Hirooki Goto [2] vs. Chase Owens [2] - 7/10
There was a small second towards the end that I thought that Owens was beating Goto and leaving him along in with two points. This was pretty good, I had made some comments about Owens discovering his strong style, and this match helped a lot towards that direction, but he still needs to work on his selling. Finish saw Owens come really really close to hitting the package piledriver, but Goto escaped, turned it into a GTR, and won.

G1 Climax 2021 Block B Match
SANADA [4] vs. Jeff Cobb [10] - 8/10
I think this was Cobb's strongest showing in the whole G1, I would consider SANADA the second top guy from the block, even over Tanahashi at this point, and Cobb was still super dominant over SANADA. Cobb was just overpowering at everything that SANADA attempted, and while he gave Cobb a good fight, Cobb just kept getting back up and blocking SANADA, even the finish was a reflection of that, with Cobb catching SANADA's moonsault mid-air, turning it into the Tour of the Islands, and getting the pin.

G1 Climax 2021 Block B Match
Hiroshi Tanahashi [6] vs. EVIL [8] (w/Dick Togo) - 6/10
This had been frustrating from all cheating from EVIL and Togo, but Tanahashi's comebacks kept my hopes up that he'd go into a big finish where he overcomes the odds one way or another and wins, but no, it was one of those EVIL energy void finishes. This was even more frustrating since Tana was out like a minute before EVIL finally got the pin, it's all that time that drains the crowd. I haven't seen the post-match promos, but I hope Tanahashi acknowledges that him using the Everything Is Evil and a low blow were the things that reflected how he allowed his mind to get affected by EVIL and betraying himself like that was the reason he ended up losing.

G1 Climax 2021 Block B Match
Taichi [4] (w/Miho Abe) vs. Kazuchika Okada [10] - 9/10
I really liked this match, especially everything that happened after the Rainmaker pose. Up until then, it had been an Okada match, the methodical work and slow escalation, but once that Rainmaker pose came, Taichi opened the 7th gate and woke up. The final minutes saw Okada completely lose control of the match he had been dominating and come really close to losing, it got to the point that Taichi's bomber was stronger than Okada's lesser Rainmakers, but he was able to regroup, block the Sumo stance bomber, hit a piledriver and Rainmaker for the win.

Taichi has been awesome, he should be getting EVIL's points.

OVERALL THOUGHTS
Good show, it started kinda slow, the first matches were not particularly exciting match-ups, EVIL vs Tanahashi was weak, but between Cobb, SANADA, Taichi, and Okada, they took the show to second gear. We're nearing the end and only three men are still alive, I can't foresee any other finalist from Block B than Okada.

Block A
Great-O-Khan - 3-0-3 -- 6
KENTA - 4-0-2 -- 8
Kota Ibushi - 4-0-2 -- 8
Shingo Takagi - 4-0-2 -- 8
Tanga Loa - 2-0-4 -- 4
Tetsuya Naito - 0-0-6 -- 0
Tomohiro Ishii - 3-0-3 -- 6
Toru Yano - 3-0-3 -- 6
Yujiro Takahashi - 2-0-4 -- 4
Zack Sabre Jr. - 5-0-1 -- 10

Block B
Chase Owens - 1-0-5 -- 2
EVIL - 5-0-1 -- 10
Hirooki Goto - 2-0-4 -- 4
Hiroshi Tanahashi - 3-0-3 -- 6
Jeff Cobb - 6-0-0 -- 12
Kazuchika Okada - 6-0-0 -- 12
SANADA - 2-0-4 -- 4
Taichi - 2-0-4 -- 4
Tama Tonga - 2-0-4 -- 4
YOSHI-HASHI - 2-0-4 -- 4
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