NJPW Announces Major Injury Ahead of 46th Anniversary Show

New Japan Pro Wrestling’s English Language Twitter account @njpw_global has announced that Los Ingobernables stable member EVIL will be unable to compete at their upcoming 46th Anniversary show due to a fractured orbital bone. EVIL was originally scheduled to face YOSHI-HASHI and Hirooki Goto as part of a tag team match alongside stable mate SANADA. New Japan has now confirmed that this will be a singles match pitting YOSHI-HASHI against SANADA, the company sent out the following press release confirming the change to the bout:

“As a result of EVIL suffering a fractured orbital bone, the tag match scheduled for March 6’s Anniversary show featuring EVIL and SANADA against YOSHI-HASHI and Hirooki Goto has now been changed to a special single match with SANADA facing YOSHI-HASHI.

These two have a deep connection to one another, having attempted to take the NJPW tryout test on the same day: November 3, 2005. SANADA took a circuitous route to eventually debuting in New Japan, joining Los Ingobernables De Japon in April 2016. His appearance immediately drew YOSHI-HASHI’s ire, and the two were embroiled in several tag matches. This included YOSHI-HASHI scoring a memorable submission win over SANADA in a tag bout in Osaka Jo Hall that year via his Butterfly Lock.

On March 12 last year in Hyogo, the two finally faced each other one on one for the first time. Then, SANADA got the tap out victory with Skull End. The LIJ member has the 1-0 singles edge. Yet while YOSHI-HASHI suffered defeat at the hands of Tetsuya Naito at the New Beginning in Osaka, he bounced back, beating EVIL in Okinawa on February 14 with his new pinning combination, the Kinkoji. With renewed momentum, YOSHI-HASHI could right his record with SANADA, but Cold Skull has his own wrongs to right after a hard fought defeat against Kazuchika Okada on February 10.”