NJPW Reveals Schedule and Participants for New Japan Cup 2019 Tournament

New Japan Pro Wrestling recently announced the full schedule and list of participants for this year’s New Japan Cup tournament. This year’s tournament takes place from March 8th to March 24th and will air live on New Japan World with English commentary as an option for all shows. The winner of this year’s tournament will receive an automatic title shot for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship at ROH-NJPW G1 Supercard on April 6th.

Unlike previous years, the field for this year’s tournament was announced to be expanded from sixteen to thirty two competitors although it will retain the same single-elimination format.

First Round Matchups
March 8 – Tokyo, Japan:

• Manabu Nakanishi vs. YOSHI-HASHI
• Tomoaki Honma vs. Taichi
• Juice Robinson vs. Chase Owens
• Yuji Nagata vs. Tomohiro Ishii

March 9 – Aichi, Japan:

• Mikey Nicholls vs. HIKULEO
• Kazuchika Okada vs. Michael Elgin
• Will Ospreay vs. Bad Luck Fale
• Toa Henare vs. Lance Archer

March 10 – Hyogo, Japan:

• Kota Ibushi vs. Tetsuya Naito
• EVIL vs. Zack Sabre Jr.
• Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Shota Umino
• Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. David Finlay

March 11 – Kagawa, Japan:

• Togi Makabe vs. Colt Cabana
• Hirooki Goto vs. SANADA
• Satoshi Kojima vs. Minoru Suzuki
• Toru Yano vs. Davey Boy Smith Jr.

The second round will be taking place from March 13-17, the quarter-finals from March 20-21, and the semi-finals on March 23rd.