NJPW Best of the Super Juniors Day 2 Sees Jun Kasai Start His Campaign with a Loss, Others Pulling into the Lead

By Noah Leatherland

NJPW and the Best of the Super Juniors took over the Esforta Arena Hachioji for the second day of tournament action. Since the announcement of his involvement, NJPW fans have been eager to see how Jun Kasai would mesh with the field, with his opening match with Titan demonstrating his violent tendencies.

Kasai’s first block match pit him against CMLL’s Titan. Kasai quickly took things to the outside, where plenty of chairs were waiting for his luchador opponent. Kasai even attempted to introduce a bundle of skewers into the match, only for the wooden weapons to end up pushed into his own forehead. Titan proved to be too tricky an opening opponent for Kasai. Titan caught Kasai in a pin, pushing himself up to 4 points, and leaving Kasai at the bottom of A Block.

Titan now sits at the top of A Block, but he was not the only competitor to reach 4 points and push themselves out in front of the pack. Elsewhere in A Block, a quick, two-minute victory over Master Wato propelled Ryusuke Taguchi to 4 points. Kosei Fujita joins them on 4 points, earning his points from a hotly contested battle with AEW’s Nick Wayne.

In B Block, DDT’s Daisuke Sasaki continued to prove himself as a dangerous wild card in the tournament. A win over a former BOSJ winner KUSHIDA launches Sasaki to the top of B Block. Sasaki was soon joined at the 4 point total by SHO. He scored a win over TMDK’s Robbie Eagles thanks to a suite of underhanded tactics, the most effective being a metal plate. Nevertheless, a win is a win in these round robin tournaments, and SHO puts himself in a great position with that win.

The vast majority of the field currently sit on 0 or 2 points. However, with so much still to play for, someone sitting at the bottom of their block at present could still find themselves in contention to advance to the finals. The third day of Best of the Super Juniors action is slated for May 17th.

Here are the full results for NJPW Best of the Super Juniors Day 2, courtesy of purolove.com:

• A Block: Valiente Jr. [2] def. Daiki Nagai [0] (4:50)
• A Block: Ryusuke Taguchi [4] def. Master Wato [0] (2:10)
• B Block: YOH [2] def. Jakob Austin Young [0] (5:18)
• A Block: Robbie X [2] def. Francesco Akira [0] (8:53)
• B Block: Daisuke Sasaki [4] def. KUSHIDA [2] (7:17)
• A Block: Titan [4] def. Jun Kasai [0] (9:08)
• B Block: SHO [4] def. Robbie Eagles [0] (12:10)
• A Block: Kosei Fujita [4] def. Nick Wayne [2] (11:38)
• B Block: El Desperado [2] def. Taiji Ishimori [2] (15:01)

Here are the current standings for the Best of the Super Juniors:

A Block

Kosei Fujita – 4 pts
Ryusuke Taguchi – 4 pts
Titan – 4 pts
Nick Wayne – 2 pts
Valiente Jr. – 2 pts
Robbie X – 2 pts
Jun Kasai – 0 pts
Daiki Nagai – 0 pts
Master Wato – 0 pts
Francesco Akira – 0 pts

B Block

Daisuke Sasaki – 4 pts
SHO – 4 pts
KUSHIDA – 2 pts
Taiji Ishimori – 2 pts
Hyo – 2 pts
YOH – 2 pts
El Desperado – 2 pts
Robbie Eagles – 0 pts
Jakob Austin Young – 0 pts
Yoshinobu Kanemaru – 0 pts