NJPW G1 Climax 28 Night 8: Results, Review, Standings, Grades

Tetsuya Naito vs Tama Tonga

Loa’s out with Tama. Naito takes his sweet time taking off the entrance attire, which pisses of Tama. Naito then requests that Loa leaves. He seems to oblige, but distracts on his way up the ramp long enough for Tama to gain the early advantage. The bell rings and Loa isn’t going anywhere.

They work at an extremely fast pace. Like, it’s crazy how quick both guys are. It felt like I was watching a match at 2x speed.

Naito is clearly superior, but everytime he starts to get ahead, Loa’s there to help his brother stay in it. Mid way through the match, a Gun Stun to the top rope, powerbomb on the ramp, and Tongan Twist gets Tama a great near fall. Still, Naito powers through. What a guy.

Similar to Night 7’s Evil vs Fale match, this breaks down into a faction vs faction brawl. EVIL takes out Loa, Fale takes out EVIL, Bushi runs off Fale. Tama hits the low blow and goes for the decisive Gun Stun, but Naito counters with a low blow of his own followed by DESTIIIIINNNOOOOOOOOOO. Naito moves to 3-1, and Mr. Tonga is taking Ls.

I know everyone probably hated this match cause of all the interference and run ins and low blows, but they can get over it. It was fun, with a wild finish. Some of the first half of the match was somewhat sloppy, and Tama probably should’ve been DQ’d a couple times, but whatever. The in ring action was solid enough to mostly distract from the nonsense.

Rating: ***3/4

Tomohiro Ishii vs Zack Sabre Jr

They grapple from the start. ZSJ tries to lock in a few submissions, but Ishii powers out of each. Sabre gets ahead of himself and starts trying to throw hands. Of course, Tom is impervious to the strikes from his puny adversary, and starts absolutely battering him.

Ishii dominates until the Technical Wizard decides to get back to the Technical stuff. The rest of the match is a good back and forth contest with both guys trying to fight to their strengths.

Ishii was resilient, but Sabre ended up being too persistent. Down the stretch, he went for submission after submission. Ishii powered out of each of them until a particularly nasty armbar was locked on. Ishii taps and commentary sells it as a huge deal.

After all the shenanigans of the first two block matches, this is exactly what this night needed- a good, no nonsense match from two of the best no nonsense wrestlers in the world.

Rating: ****