New Japan Pro Wrestling has announced the brackets for the 11th annual New Japan Cup!
Traditionally, the winner of the tournament becomes the #1 contender to the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship. However, in 2014 winner Shinsuke Nakamura used his victory to challenge for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship. For the first time, in 2015 the winner of the New Japan Cup will have the option of challenging for either the IWGP Heavyweight, IWGP Intercontinental, or the NEVER Openweight Championship.
Here are the first round matches, set to take place in Tokyo, Japan on March 5:
Bracket 1
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Toru Yano
Kota Ibushi vs. Doc Gallows
Tetsuya Naito vs. “Machine Gun” Karl Anderson
Kazuchika Okada vs. Bad Luck Fale
Bracket 2
Togi Makabe vs. Tomoaki Honma
Yoshi-Hashi vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Yuji Nagata vs. Hirooki Goto
Satoshi Kojima vs. Katsuyori Shibata
