Top NJPW Star Wants To Focus On Tag Team Wrestling

NJPW

A top NJPW star wants to focus on tag team wrestling.

At NJPW Sakura Genesis, SANADA defeated Kazuchika Okada to win the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship. Despite over a decade since returning to New Japan Pro Wrestling from excursion, Okada has only been involved in the main event scene.

Earlier this year, “The Rainmaker” teamed with Hiroshi Tanahashi in a failed attempt at the IWGP Tag Team Championships against Bishamon.

At this Saturday’s NJPW Capital Collision, Okada and Tanahashi will challenge The Motor City Machine Guns for the NJPW STRONG Openweight Tag Team Championships in a three-way match also including Aussie Open.

Speaking with Justin Barrasso of Sports Illustrated, the former IWGP World Heavyweight Champion has admitted that he wants to focus on tag team wrestling following his loss to SANADA. Okada said:

“For now, I want to focus on tag wrestling,” Okada said through a translator. “I think Sanada’s challenge will be to be recognized by every wrestling fan as the champion. But then again, he did beat me, so that should be easy.”

“The Rainmaker” continued on to express how his and Tanahashi’s last match made him want to team with his long-time rival, saying:

“I think it will be an interesting story for the two of us. I just wrestled him [in February] at Battle in the Valley, and it was important to me to have a title match with Tanahashi.”

“I feel like now I’ve wrestled him in pretty much any situation. We’ve been bettering each other since 2012; we have such a story together. I think tagging with him will be a great experience for me to grow as a wrestler.”

As previously reported, David Finlay has teased revealing a new Bullet Club member at this Saturday’s Capital Collision event.

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• Hiroshi Tanahashi
• Kazuchika Okada
• tag team wrestling
• NJPW

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