NJPW G1 Climax 29 Night 13 results: SANADA and Okada tease time-limit draw in Osaka

Night 13 of the NJPW G1 Climax 29 tournament kicked off the first of back-to-back shows at Edion Arena in Osaka and featured the next round of A-Block matches, with a rematch of last year’s finals between G1 28 winner Hiroshi Tanahashi and Kota Ibushi, and the last installment of the 2019 Kazuchika Okada vs. SANADA trilogy that featured a shocking finish.

Juice Robinson and Toa Henare def. Ren Narita and Yota Tsuji

This was a solid opener. The Young Lions team looked great; Juice was extra mean and had a good exchange with Tsuji. Henare put Tsuji away with the Toa Bottom to pick up the win for his team.

Tomohiro Ishii, Hirooki Goto & YOSHI-HASHI def. Toru Yano, Jeff Cobb & Tomoaki Honma via submission

More CHAOS vs. CHAOS action on Saturday. Yano and Ishii and Cobb and Goto have matches in the same venue on Sunday and they tried to preview those bouts. The crowd was into Yano’s antics. Goto and Cobb complemented each other and will probably have a good match together, a retread of their matches over the NEVER Open Weight Title from last year, possibly. YOSHI-HASHI tapped Honma with the butterfly lock to grab the win for his team.

Minoru Suzuki, Taichi & Yoshinobu Kanemaru def. Tetsuya Naito, Shingo Takagi & BUSHI

Suzuki-gun jumped LIJ before the bell and things were on the floor in seconds. Suzuki buried BUSHI in chairs and pieces of the guardrail deep into the crowd. Taichi snuck in cheap shots on Naito and Takagi on the floor. Later, Kanemaru hit a nice satellite DDT on Takagi, but later Takagi came back and hit Made in Japan on Kanemaru for the win. Standard LIJ vs Suzuki-gun fare here. Takagi and Naito bumped fists but on Sunday they’ll square off in Osaka in a late B-Block match.

Jay White and Chase Owens def. Jon Moxley and Shota Umino

Short but really fun. Moxley and Umino entered the ring through the crowd. White and Mox will finally face off on Sunday in the B Block. Both got into it early on, White jawed at Moxley as he and Owens worked over Umino, firing Moxley up. White would often tease Mox and then roll out of the ring. Owens and White were a great heel tag here and were always in the right place — when Umino would go to tag Mox, they’d always stop the tag out of nowhere.

Umino finally returned the attack and he and Mox hit a Hart Attack into a Boston Crab. White kept chopping and elbowing Umino, who fought through it. White later hit the Bladerunner on Umino as Owens kept Moxley on the floor for the quick win. I have a feeling White and Moxley will be very good together.

A Block: Bad Luck Fale (4) (w/ Jado & Chase Owens) def. KENTA (8)

KENTA slapped Fale in the face during their stare-down, so Fale picked him up by the throat. Fale best on him for a while both in the ring and on the floor. Fale was sweating buckets already. KENTA tried slapping Fale again; Fale resounded with a harder slap that took KENTA off his feet.

There was a spot where KENTA went for a springboard missile dropkick but Fale was so out of place that KENTA whiffed completely. But Fale sold it anyways and flew into the corner. It was almost at Jeff Hardy vs. Jinder Mahal at Greatest Royal Rumble levels of botch-ness.

KENTA did the Shibata dropkick in the corner. When Fale went for the Grenade KENTA reversed it into a triangle and then the Game Over omoplata with crossface. Here, Chase Owens distracted the ref so Jado could sneak in the ring, which KENTA took care of quickly, but Fale was able to use a schoolboy and pin KENTA to win.

A Block: Zack Sabre Jr. (6) def. Lance Archer (4)

Archer decked every single Young Lion standing at ringside before the match. Everybody died. Sabre strutted to the ring with an opposite demeanor, cool and cocky, Britsh Heavyweight Title around his waist, two from the same faction with entirely different personas ready to scrap in the one singles bout they’ll likely have all year with each other.

Archer chased after Sabre early on, with Sabre talking a lot of trash. Archer finally got his hands on Sabre and rag-dolled him into the corner. Sabre was quick in moving from hold to hold but Archer’s size kept Sabre from following through with any takedowns. Archer did a kip-up and some other agile ring movements with ease. Whenever Zack seemed to be gaining the upper hand Archer would power his way out of whichever of technique Sabre used.

They fought on the top rope after Sabre knocked Archer off his rope walk. He started countering every power move Archer threw at him, with triangle chokes and arm bars and other variations. The same thing happened when Archer went for the EBD Claw; Sabre countered with an arm bar.

Archer used a massive chokeslam for two, but then Zack slipped out of a Blackout slam by first taking his back and then transitioning to a scissors pin to score the win in just over 10 minutes. Great match. Archer took out referee Marty Asami in the EBD Claw afterwards.

A Block: EVIL (8) def. Will Ospreay (4)

Go out of your way to watch this one. This had a big-match feel from the beginning, and both Ospreay and EVIL had pockets of rabid fans scattered over Edion Arena. Ospreay hit a Frankensteiner early on and EVIL rolled to the floor. He threw a chair into the ring but Ospreay passed it to Red Shoes. They had an awesome exchange in the ring, sans chair. Back on the floor moments later, EVIL wrapped another steel chair around Ospreay’s neck and whacked him across the neck with it. Home run.

EVIL dominated Ospreay and worked his neck over with a few submission holds. The crowd sounded heavily behind Ospreay. There then was more back and forth between the two, but EVIL got the better of many of the exchanges. Ospreay hit Pip Pip Cheerio. EVIL moved quickly in this match and showed he could hang with top-flight juniors just as well as with aces like Tanahashi.

Ospreay hit the Ospreay Special to the floor, flush and perfect. He sold his neck throughout. He landed a long-range missile dropkick to a prone EVIL. To turn the tables in seconds, EVIL dodged Ospreay, sprinted to the corner and burst out of it with an explosive lariat.

They had a few more hot exchanges and it all peaked when Ospreay landed a Liger Bomb on EVIL for two. The crowd lost it here. Ospreay missed a Hidden Blade but connected with a hook kick. EVIL laid in a hard headbutt and went for a running lariat but Ospreay reversed it with a Spanish Fly and then drilled him to the mat with a picture-perfect Os-Cutter for thre—woah, just two.

Things somehow peaked even higher from here with tons of rapid-fire exchanges. Ospreay went for a double jump Os-Cutter but EVIL caught him, then landed two brutal half-nelson suplexes and a running lariat for another two and three quarters count. EVIL finally stuck Everything is Evil and scored the emphatic pin. What a match.

A Block: Kota Ibushi (8) def. Hiroshi Tanahashi (8)

Ibushi and Tanahashi circled each other for a bit, trading waistlocks and headlocks. The pace here was half that of EVIL and Ospreay just before. Tanahashi worked over Ibushi’s knee with an Indian deathlock variation.

Ibushi returned with a flurry of kicks, open hand strikes and a standing moonsault. The crowd was split between the two and the voices in Osaka sounded mostly like tons of females losing their minds. This was really apparent whenever Ibushi was back in one of Tanahashi’s submissions. He locked in a high-angle Texas Cloverleaf for a while until Ibushi grabbed the ropes for a break.

Tana went for a High Fly Flow to the floor but Ibushi jumped to the apron and springboarded himself from to the top rope and used a super Frankensteiner to drive Tanahashi back into the middle of the ring. He landed the second rope German suplex the middle of the ring on Tanahashi, something Ibushi only uses in bigger matches.

They did a throwback to their slap-off in last year’s finals and boy did they slap the hell out of each other. Both of their faces were red after the exchange, which Ibushi won with a lariat. Ibushi’s mouth was bleeding.

Tana planted Ibushi on top of his neck with a Slingblade. He missed the High Fly Flow after this, then a boma-ye for a close two, and finally a kamigoe for the three-count in just over 20 minutes. It felt more like 10. Incredible work from both.

A Block: SANADA (6) def. Kazuchika Okada (12)

Their current NJPW singles record is Okada 7, SANADA 0. The first minute of this consisted of both standing in the ring letting the crowd shower them with chants, dueling ones, though a little heavier in favor of Okada. They started slowly, picking up the pace every now and then in pin attempts but everything here felt measured, spots picked for specific reasons and with more than a minute of thought behind them.

Okada and SANADA went to the floor where Okada nailed a DDT onto the floor. In the ring, at one point, he did a cocky Rainmaker pose and put his foot on SANADA for the pin attempt which turned some of the crowd on him as they began a loud chant for SANADA. He later dropkicked Okada to the floor and hit a pescado with wide extension to work this crowd up even more than they already had been. He wrapped Okada into a Paradise Lock and blasted him in the hip with a low dropkick.

Okada came back and landed a nice flying elbow drop for two, and later a went for a Rainmaker, but SANADA ducked and pulled off a rope-assisted Magic Killer. The crowd again was split but this time they sounded slightly more in favor of SANADA as both wrestlers sold on the mat after this.

Things then got a bit more heated, and at around 15 minutes into this they started laying in hard elbows and European uppercuts. SANADA got the better of that particular exchange and the volume levels were deafening in Edion Arena. Okada went for another tombstone but SANADA again reversed with a Skull End dragon sleeper. He gave up on it and went for a Tiger Suplex for two. He missed the moonsault but landed on his feet. He moonsaulted himself into another Skull End but Okada countered with two Rainmakers but didn’t go for the pin.

Okada went for another Rainmaker, but SANADA reversed it into one of his own, and swung Okada around and locked in the Skull End once more. Twenty-five minutes had passed at this point. Okada tried to fight out of Skull End, but SANADA kept locking it in. He sold it like he was cranking Okada’s neck completely off. Okada fought out of it and leaned back into a pin for two, but again SANADA locked in the Skull End. Okada looked to be passed out so SANADA went for a moonsault but Okada got his feet up. Massive chants for both here; just wow.

With one minute left Okada went for another Rainmaker but SANADA ducked and turned it into a pop-up cutter, then landed a moonsault to Okada’s back, then another with Okada face-up, to win. SANADA finally beats Okada clean in the middle of the ring with only 20 seconds left to spare in the match. The Osaka crowd lost it. After the match, SANADA cut a promo saying he hated Osaka before because he had to wrestle his rival Okada here, but after today it’s his favorite city.

Check back with more coverage from Night 14 in Osaka at Edion Arena.

Current G1 Standings

A Block
Kazuchika Okada 12
KENTA 8
Hiroshi Tanahashi 8
EVIL 8
Kota Ibushi 8
Zack Sabre Jr. 6
SANADA 6
Lance Archer 4
Will Ospreay 4
Bad Luck Fale 4

B Block
Jon Moxley 10
Juice Robinson 6
Tomohiro Ishii 6
Jeff Cobb 6
Toru Yano 6
Tetsuya Naito 6
Hirooki Goto 6
Shingo Takagi 4
Taichi 4
Jay White 4