In a night where every championship on the card changed hands, “The Ace” Hiroshi Tanahashi defeated Kenny Omega to win the IWGP Heavyweight Championship for the eighth time in his career in the main event of Wrestle Kingdom 13.
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Omega entered the match as the brash defending champion looking to move the Japanese promotion into the future, while Tanahashi was the stalwart veteran who didn’t like Omega’s underhanded tactics and wanted to see if he could pull off one more reign as world champion. He earned a shot against Omega after winning the month-long G1 Climax tournament over the Summer, and with his victory he became the first man to win in the main event of Wrestle Kingdom after winning the infamously grueling tournament.
The match last nearly 40 minutes, with Omega battling through Tanahashi wearing down his legs with a series of V-Trigger knee strikes and Dragon Supleces. He looked to have the match won after setting up for his One-Winged Angel finisher, but Tanahashi countered it for the second time in the match to set up for his High Fly Flow frog splash finisher.
All eight of the show’s championship matches saw a title change hands, starting with Will Ospreay defeating Kota Ibushi for the NEVER Openweight Championship. Ibushi had to be carried out on a stretcher after the match, as he appeared to suffer a concussion after Ospreay hit him in the back of the head with an elbow strike.
Other title changes included Sanada and Evil winning the IWGP Heavyweight Tag Team Championships, Juice Robinson defeating Cody for the IWGP United States Championship and Tetsuya Naito overcoming numerous attacks from Chris Jericho to win the IWGP Intercontinental Championship in a No Disqualification match.
An overall theme slowly developed as the show went on, as every member of The Elite faction wound up losing at some point on the card. Along with Rhodes and Omega, The Young Bucks took the pin in their triple threat tag team match and Adam Page, Yujiro Takahashi and Marty Scurll were the first team to be eliminated in a trios gauntlet match in the preshow.
That pattern could be a sign of things to come for the group, as the Bucks, Rhodes and Page announced on Tuesday that they would be launching their own wrestling promotion, All Elite Wrestling, in the near future. As a result, Friday’s event was reportedly the last time all four men would appear in the promotion for the foreseeable future.
