Cero Reviews NJPW New Years Golden Series 2022, 2.19

[cero2k]

NJPW New Years Golden Series 2022, Day 14
January 19, 2022
Hokkaido Prefectural Sports Center, Sapporo, Japan

Kosei Fujita & Togi Makabe vs. Suzuki-gun (DOUKI & TAKA Michinoku) - 5/10
Ok opener, DOUKI and Fujita carried this match. Makabe and TAKA are ok, but it was the other two in the ring that made me care. DOUKI and TAKA won with a double superkick and the DOUKI Chokie on Fujita for the submission.

Ryohei Oiwa & Toru Yano vs. Suzuki-gun (Minoru Suzuki & Taichi) - 5/10
Ok match, they're building Yano vs Suzuki for tomorrow, so part of the match was about that. Prior to the match, Yano rolled out the dog cage they're going to be using for that match, while Suzuki brought out some handcuffs. Those things only really came into play until the end when Suzuki handcuffed Yano to the cage and forced him to roll the cage out along with himself.

Oiwa as expected took the loss, but the work between him and Taichi was the highlight of the match, at least considering that Yano and Suzuki were mostly focused on shenanigans and brawling.

CHAOS (Tomohiro Ishii & YOH) vs. House Of Torture (Dick Togo & SHO) - 5/10
It's a match with Togo, of course it was full of HoT crap. The small glimpses of actual wrestling between YOH and SHO, and Ishii beating up Togo were good, but that was it. The only relevant thing here was that YOH tapped out Togo with Stargazer, which I don't remember him using it lately.

Tomoaki Honma vs. Great-O-Khan - 7/10
This was surprisingly good, I never doubt O-Khan, but Honma did a good job hanging with him and since he's become such an underdog, it made O-Khan's offense even more impressive. And while I never expected Honma to win, he did make me pop for the Kokeshi combo near fall. O-Khan would end up winning with the Eliminator.

Kazuchika Okada, Satoshi Kojima & Yuji Nagata vs. Los Ingobernables de Japon (Hiromu Takahashi, Shingo Takagi & Tetsuya Naito) - 8/10
Great match. Not only did we have the required Okada versus Naito pair up, but we got to see Takagi versus Nagata and Hiromu pair up with, well, everyone. Most of the time was spent between Okada and Naito, and they didn't hold out that much, the finish actually worked around Naito dropping Okada with a Destino and taking him out of commission while Shingo finished off Nagata with the Last of the Dragons.

Post-match - As a means to sell the Destino, Naito dropkicked Okada again on the floor and got a visible pin for 3 seconds, as counted by Hiromu.

IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Title Four Way Match
Flying Tiger (Robbie Eagles & Tiger Mask) (c) vs. BULLET CLUB's Cutest Tag Team (El Phantasmo & Taiji Ishimori) vs. Six Or Nine (Master Wato & Ryusuke Taguchi) vs. Suzuki-gun (El Desperado & Yoshinobu Kanemaru) - 8.5/10
When Taguchi and Romero started to chase the tag titles, part of it was because they wanted to be the 69th champions, it didn't work out and Taguchi replaced Romero with Wato and kept chasing that dream. Things almost fell through a couple of days ago when Wato considered breaking up the team because he wanted to focus on the singles Jr. title, but Taguchi didn't give up and it ended up paying off in this match, with them hitting an assisted facebuster on Tiger Mask for the win.

The match was chaotic, it started on second gear and it only pushed forward. With so many people, there was never a dull moment in the ring, and of course we had a lot of dives and big spots. It was really refreshing to see that even with two heel teams in the ring, the real rivalry was felt between Flying Tiger and Six Or Nine.

Flying Tiger was a team that I never would had imagined it would work out, but Eagles and Mask ended up having good chemistry and complemented each other well in the ring, but truth be told, I think it was the right time to take the titles off them.

IWGP Tag Team Title Match
Bishamon (Hirooki Goto & YOSHI-HASHI) (c) (w/Tomohiro Ishii & YOH) vs. House Of Torture (EVIL & Yujiro Takahashi) (w/Dick Togo & SHO) - 6.5/10
I feel like I've reached the point where HoT matches have to be analyzed for what is not Togo shenanigans and then just subtract a couple of points for the rest, and an extra one if EVIL or SHO wins and they suck the energy out of the venue.

This was one of those match that as much as I dread the Togo interference and the use of weapons, at the end I end up liking it a bit more because they babyfaces were able to overcome the cheating and get the win. The problem is getting there, and when you have a babyface in peril part with Togo interfering, it makes it hard to keep interest. Having said that, I do enjoy watching Goto and EVIL wrestle each other, and I liked the parts where Ishii and YOH were out there to help Goto and YH, since something that this match had was a LOT of chaotic brawling even before the match started. At the end, Goto and YH got the win with Shoto over Yujiro.

IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship Match
Hiroshi Tanahashi (c) vs. SANADA - 8.5/10
I honestly believe this is the best SANADA has looked, gear-wise, since his debut with the black mohawk. I'm really happy he finally dropped the whole intergalactic look and long blonde beard.

The match was great, but it wasn't anything out of the ordinary from SANADA and Tana, they're still meshes together nicely when both men start to work their respective matches, SANADA the neck and back, and Tana the leg. This is the type of match that you won't like unless you wanna see spots and innovation, instead it's just straight up good wrestling. Finish ended up coming when Tanahashi was going for the High Fly Flow combos, but SANADA rolled out, got the Japanese clutch in, and got the win.

I'm happy SANADA won this title, I would have liked to see him as the IC title back when the title was alive, but now that the US title is the second most important title in the promotion, I'll take it. The most important thing to me here is for SANADA to get a run with a singles title in a high visibility spot that will force him to step up even more when it comes to the charisma aspects, but also let him grow comfortable being on the spotlight. The one dangerous thing is that I don't think SANADA is necessarily popular in the US for probably really dumb reasons, but if it means that they want to send him to the US for tours, I don't know if he'll be received like a superstar.

Post-match - SANADA cut his winner's promo with his firefly thing.

OVERALL THOUGHTS
Overall a good show, the weak stuff was still 'good' and it went by fast. I wouldn't say it's a must watch show, maybe the Jr tag title match and the main event if it's your thing, as explained about SANADA and Tana's style.