NJPW: New Japan Cup Dates Set, Early Winner Projection

New Japan have announced the dates of this year’s New Japan Cup:

• The First round matches will be taking place on March 11th/12th.
• The Second round matches will be split between 4 shows from March 13th through to March 17th
• The Semi-Final bouts will be taking place on March 19th
• The Final will take place March 20th

The winner of the annual tournament will then decide to challenge for either the IWGP Heavyweight, IWGP Intercontinental or NEVER Openweight title at the company’s April 9th show at the Ryogoku Kokugikan.

The tournament has a very prestigious history, previous winners include Hiroshi Tanahashi, Yuji Nagata, Kazuchika Okada, Shinsuke Nakamura, Kota Ibushi and the 2016 winner Tetsuya Naito.

The winner of this year’s tournament is likely to challenge for the IWGP Heavyweight title as the current champion Kazuchika Okada does not yet have a clear feud going forward. After his bout at New Beginning with Minoru Suzuki he hinted at Tiger Mask W as a possible challenger for his belt, this may lead to Tiger Mask finally being unmasked as Kota Ibushi and leading to a program for the title.