New Japan Pro Wrestling Road to Tokyo Dome 12/21/2020

New Japan Pro Wrestling Road to Tokyo Dome 12/21/2020

Satoshi Kojima, Togi Makabe and Tiger Mask vs Gabriel Kidd, Yuya Uemura and Yota Tsuji

Yuya and Togi counter each other on the mat to start. Yuya full double leg's Makabe and gets triangle'd. Yuya his a nice dropkick and some shots before they both tag out. Kidd and Tiger fire chops at each other. Makabe blasts Kidd with a forearm but Kidd hangs in there. Yota rushes with forearms then gets slammed.

Yota and Yuya hit a nice double dropkick and Kojima takes a bunch of offense. Kidd eats a tiger driver and sells it to the outside and Kojima hits a cutter on Yota. Yota comes back with a spear but Kojima hits him with a big lariat to win it. Good match here with the rookies showing fire and everyone hitting stiff shots.

Toa Henare and Juice Robinson vs Yujiro Takahashi and KENTA

Yujiro looks like a real mess these days. He tries to slam Toa's head into the buckles and Toa slams his own head in before headbutting Yuj. Yujiro bites him but gets shouldered down hard. Toa gets stun-gunned and goes over the top. Everyone is outside and Toa gets choked with a cane.

Toa gets beaten up for a while and starts to comeback, daring Kenta to kick him in the leg. Toa delay suplexes him. Juice comes in and hits some offense on both opponents. Kenta regains control though and powerslams Juice. Yujiro hits some bad offense amd Juice takes a suplex into a baseball slide. We get a close nearfall with an olympic slam on Juice. Toa hits a nice spin kick and then takes a kick back from Kenta, before Juice leg lariat's Kenta.

Toa gets a big spear in and Juice hits an unprettier on Yujiro for the win. It went just a few minutes more than it should have but there was nothing really wrong with it. After the match, Kenta tries to hit Juice with the briefcase but he ducks it.

Master Wato, Ryusuke Taguchi and Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs Yoshinobu Kanemaru, El Desperado and Minoru Suzuki

Totally not a filler match here and Suzuki's team gets nailed at the bell. Wato hurricanrana's Desperado outside and then tornillo's him.  Wato gets thrown into Taguchi's butt and Taguchi celebrates, since he can't see wha happened. He finally turns around to find Suzuki and does a funny reaction. Taguchi gets worked over by the heels and armbarred by Suzuki.

They trade forearms and Taguchi butt bumps him. Tenzan and Suzuki trade shots and Tenzan waterwheel drops him. The heels try to attack Tenzan in the head but end up hurting from it and Tenzan spinning heel kicks Kanemaru. Wato hits a nice spinkick to the face on him and a diving springboard euro uppercut. Wato gets 3v1'd for a 2 count and Tenzan saves him after a Kanemaru drop down DDT from the top. Wato then reverses a suplex into a tilt-a-whirl for a pin.

Nothing wrong with this. There was a little bit of comedy here and the heels did what they were supposed to. 

DOUKI, Zack Sabre Jr. and Taichi vs Chase Owens, Tanga Loa and Tama Tonga

What a bad looking line-up this is. They go outside to start. Zack does a pele kick to the arm then does a cool legsweep on Tonga but Tonga comes back with a spinebuster. After a bad beat down on Zack, Taichi comes in and starts choking people. Tonga puts Taichi in the reverse ddt position then turns him over to his side. Tonga takes a bunch of offense from the other team but still kicks out at 2. Taichi takes off his pants and DOUKI comes up with a roll-up on Tonga for a close 2. DOUKI dives onto Chase and dives over the top to the inside to get caught with a Tonga cutter for the win. Tonga then beats up on Douki after.

This wasn't interesting or good and was the throwaway time-filler match you'd expect it to be.

Tomoaki Honma, Hiroshi Tanahashi and Kazuchika Okada vs Jeff Cobb, Great-O-Khan and Will Osperay

Tana has a pretty cool silver jacket on with spikes. Okada has his glow in the dark gear on and the faces get jumped immediately.  Khan looks so much like Gedo right now. Tana armbars him early, but he hits the ropes. Khan then takes a 3v1. Khan hits double jumping mongolian chops and Honma misses a headbutt. Khan then puts on a head and arm choke but Honma catches the ropes.

Khan literally picks up Honma and runs him over to the corner, where he sits on top of him. Cobb then picks up Honma and carries him around. Honma suplexes Will and gets the tag to a fresh Okada who clears out everyone. Will neckbreakers him and Khan gets back in. He tree of woe's Okada and sliding dropkicks him.

Okada mounts a comeback and tags Tana in. Tana cleans house, taking down everyone. Khan has a reverse slam and takes a spinning neckbreaker on a claw attempt. Cobb and Honma get in and Honma headbutts Cobb. The faces all get in and gorilla press Honma onto Cobb with a headbutt. Honma misses a top rope headbutt and Khan claws him. Cobb then hits his spinning slam and wins it.

This wasn't bad or anything but I can't really buy the Will/Khan/Cobb pairing and I'm definitely not buying Khan as a legit threat. They did not do anything big here or anything special and you didn't miss anything if you skipped it.

After the match, Khan worked over Tana's knee with a chair. Will also takes a free shot on Okada from behind.

BUSHI, SANADA and Tetsuya Naito vs EVIL, Dick Togo and Jay White

Jay mocks Naito with "Naito" chants and Naito's crew triple dropkicks Togo. Evil rips off the turnbuckle and Togo throws Sanada and Bushi into it. Bushi takes some abuse and Evil goes for the mask. Bush then gets double sentons from Togo and Evil. Sanada comes in and Paradise Lock's both Evil and Togo then dropkicks both in the butt.

Sanada and Evil go at it with Togo tripping Sanada and Sanada getting double teamed. White and Naito get in there and Naito wraps a leg around his neck while he hits him in the head. White makes the ropes but Naito won't break. Naito then starts stomping White in the corner. White correctly yells at the ref for not stopping it sooner then does a twisting brainbuster to Naito. Naito then ezugiri's him and pop-up spinebusters him at 10 minutes in. Bushi gets in and does a nice tope onto White then spinning neckbreaker's him for 2. Bushi goes for something, gets caught then is sleeper suplexed. Everyone comes in hitting some of their big moves in a flurry with the sequence ending with White's Blade Runner. Evil hits Darkness Falls onto Bushi and White hits a Blade Runner on him too for the win.

Again, this is basically a house show main event. They stuck the basics and didn't do any big false finishes or anything out of the ordinary. The finishing sequence was okay and I did like White yelling at the ref, but it was hardly anything I would go and hunt down.

Overall thoughts: This was a build-up show to the 1/4 Dome show and was basically a house show. There wasn't anything can't miss here and they weren't going for any epics here. I'd skip it.