NJPW G1 Climax 25 – Night 7 (July 29) Review: Tetsuya Naito vs AJ Styles

NJPW G1 Climax 25
July 29, 2015 (Night 7)
Fukuoka Convention Center
Fukuoka, Japan
NJPWWorld.com

Welcome to today’s coverage of the New Japan Pro Wrestling G1 Climax, with today’s event being presented via NJPWWorld.com with commentary and multiple cameras. I think I saw Captain New Japan do commentary so I don’t think we missed much. Hopefully the crowd is more into this show than yesterday’s crowd, which wasn’t the worst on the tour thus far, but not exactly rocking my world either. So far this tournament has had its ups and downs, with some matches living up to expectations, and others not. It’s all about placement, opponent, and crowd reaction when it comes to a good match. It’s been hit or miss in this tournament so far, so let’s hope tonight’s card is one of the better ones!

Tiger Mask & Mascara Dorada defeat Jay White & David Finlay

This was short, but pretty fun. White and Finlay are a good young lion team, Tiger Mask was fine and Dorada was his usual great self. Tiger Mask took out White on the outside with a suicide dive which allowed Dorada to pick up the win with the Dorada Screwdriver. **1/2

Dropkick de @DoradoSro #G125 #NJPWWorld pic.twitter.com/9VleVsukxP

— Jocay (@Jocay19) July 29, 2015

Yujiro Takahashi & Karl Anderson & Cody Hall & Tama Tonga defeat Yuji Nagata & Yohei Komatsu & Satoshi Kojima & Ryusuke Taguchi

Just a match. Everyone paired off with someone and had the usual eight man tag but in abridged form. When Nagata and Anderson were in it was pretty great, though. It boiled down to Tama Tonga and Yohei Komatsu. They had some back and forth for a bit before Tonga pinned him clean with his waistlock DDT. **1/4

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626333496789872640

Tomoaki Honma & Michael Elgin defeat YOSHI-HASHI & Tomohiro Ishii

Crowd got into this when Honma deadlifted Ishii with a suplex. Elgin came in and he and Ishii went at it and it was awesome. The last few minutes were super heated with Honma and Yoshi Hashi scoring great near falls on one another. The crowd was white hot for it. Honma actually hit his top rope kokeshi headbutt and managed to pin Yoshi Hashi to a strong ovation. Elgin, Ishii and Honma had to be separated after the match as they all got into it. Can’t give this a rating as I was dealing with internet issues for half the match, but it looked to be one of the best tag matches on the entire show so far and it builds to potentially great matches between Elgin & Ishii and Honma & Elgin. ***1/2

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626338285539995648

Hirooki Goto & Jushin Thunder Liger defeat Kazuchika Okada & Gedo

Decent tag match. Liger and Gedo worked a lot, as well as Goto and Okada. Honestly I was watching this while also trying to figure out what the hell was wrong with my internet. Everything was fine, but just another in a long line of tag matches. Not much to it beyond that. Liger won with a surprise leg clutch hold on Gedo. **1/2

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626342020991348736

G1 Climax 25!

Doc Gallows defeats Toru Yano (2)

Good for what it was. Yano stalled a lot early. He tried to jump Gallows after a hand shake spot but Gallows no sold it. Actually it was more like Yano trying to overpower Gallows but completely and utterly failing. Gallows was very much baffled by Yano for the most part. Mostly comedy spots but Yano’s able to work them really well here. It wasn’t the best match workrate wise but it was fun. Yano took out Hall and Tonga from the apron, but Anderson comes in as he and Gallows give him the Magic Killer and Gallows pins him. ***1/4

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626349418409787392

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626349718843576321

Togi Makabe (2) defeats Hiroyoshi Tenzan (2)

Another pretty solid bout. Nothing fancy, as most of the match was just back and forth brawling. Makabe did take it to the outside early, but most of this was in the ring. At one point it seemed like he was working over Tenzan’s eye. Tenzan kept taking Makabe’s offense until Makabe pinned him with the king kong knee drop. ***

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626352436450562048

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626352840089309184

Katsuyori Shibata (4) defeats Kota Ibushi (4)

These two exchanged some great offense in the early minutes of the match, including some great mat wrestling. Crowd is SUPER into this match from the get go, it was insane. Ibushi did Shibata’s penalty kick at one point that Shibata did not take lightly and returned with one of his own that had to really smart. Most of this match had to smart, in fact. Just an insane match with incredible heat and super stiff offense. There was one period where they were constantly kicking out at one and just going insane with offense. This is a surefire match of the year candidate and required viewing if you have New Japan World. Just a step above everything else in terms of intensity and offense. They were exchanging offense when finally Shibata slapped him HARD, put him in the sleeper and pinned him with the penalty kick. *****

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626356985550774272

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626357758988783616

Bad Luck Fale (4) defeats Hiroshi Tanahashi (4)

There was a ref bump at one point that caused Hall and Tonga to come in and interfere. Fale took out one by accident and Tanahashi took the other out and sent Fale to the outside where he gave them all the big high fly flow on the outside. Tanahashi came back with two high fly flows but the Bullet Club pulled the referee out. Fale tried for the Bad Luck Fall twice but Tanahashi managed to escape both times, but did not escape the grenade. Fale went to the top rope, nearly tripped but came back and hit his own high fly flow for the win. Good match; it’s becoming more and more clear that Tanahashi’s one of the best ring generals in pro wrestling right now. ***¼

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626361217813250049

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626362439903379456

Tetsuya Naito (4) defeats AJ Styles (4)

The crowd was dead for most of this match. I’m guessing it’s due to the heel/heel dynamic, and no one wanted to cheer either guy. Nothing wrong with it early, as they were wrestling a good technical match, going back and forth. The crowd started to come back and chant for Naito for whatever reason. They were going back and forth after Naito spat at AJ. He hit a pele kick and a bloody sunday DDT but Naito countered and hit his new finisher, the sliced bread #2 into a reverse DDT for the win. Just good, not great. ***1/2

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626368455625863168

Naito took out Red Shoes after the match and cut a promo, basically saying he’ll win and said his catchphrase to close the show.

https://twitter.com/SenorLARIATO/status/626368911559274496

Final Thoughts: The Shibata/Ibushi match is must see material as I am sure it will be on many people’s match of the year ballots by the end of the day. Just an incredible match that I’m not sure that can be duplicated anytime soon. The rest of this card was pretty good as well. All that combined and this was one of the better shows of the G1.

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