YOH, Mistico & El Desperado Retain Junior Titles at NJPW Battle Line Hokkaido

By: Noah Leatherland

NJPW had their final stop before Destruction in Kobe, bringing the Battle Line Hokkaido tour to Sapporo. Both the singles and tag junior titles were on the line to close out the tour, with the champions keeping hold of their gold.

The main event saw YOH making his second defence of the IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Title against Unbound Co.’s Taiji Ishimori. In an equally matched bout, the two juniors went back and forth for over twenty minutes. Finally, YOH was able to connect with the Direct Drive and score a pinfall on Ishimori. After the bout, YOH invited the next challenger to make themselves known. Out came Ishimori’s stablemate, Robbie X, making his title intentions clear.

In his post-match comments, Ishimori was not going to let go of his championship desires:

It’s pointless unless I win. If I lose, it’s all for nothing. But listen, I’m not giving up. Do you know how many times I’ve challenged for the IWGP Junior title? I’ll get there again, without fail. I’m going to take that IWGP Junior title.

In the semi-main event, the IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Tag Team Titles were on the line. Mistico, fresh off a big win at the CMLL 93rd Aniversario, joined the NJPW tour and regrouped with his partner El Desperado. DOUKI and SHO had been angling for a title shot for a while, with the match only being made after they stole the champions’ masks on the 22nd. Fired up from the House of Torture’s antics, the champions came in hot. Managing to keep Dick Togo at bay, the finish saw the champions lock in stereo submissions, with SHO tapping out to Desperado’s Numero Dos.

Celebrating their win, and the reclamation of their masks, backstage, the champions looked ahead on the NJPW calendar.

Desperado:

For NJPW, Destruction in Kobe is next, set for September 27th in the Kobe World Memorial Hall.

Here are the full results for NJPW Battle Line Hokkaido, September 23rd, courtesy of purolove.com:

• Jake Lee & Jakob Austin Young def. Togi Makabe & Tatsuya Matsumoto (6:16)
• Shun Skywalker & Dick Togo def. Shota Umino & Masatora Yasuda (9:01)
• Shingo Takagi & Drilla Moloney def. Oleg Boltin & YOSHI-HASHI (11:02)
• Yuto-Ice, OSKAR, Jeff Cobb & Daiki Nagai def. Callum Newman, HENARE, Great-O-Khan & Zane Jay (11:29)
• Ryohei Oiwa, Hartley Jackson & Kosei Fujita def. Aaron Wolf, Yuya Uemura & Taisei Nakahara (11:11)
• Yota Tsuji & Robbie X def. Hirooki Goto & Master Wato (13:53)
• IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Tag Team Title: El Desperado & Mistico (c) def. DOUKI & SHO (21:58)
• IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Title: YOH (c) def. Taiji Ishimori (22:44)