Three of the five championships on the line changed hands on night one of NJPW The New Beginning in Sapporo.
In the show's main event, Nic Nemeth (the former Dolph Ziggler) defeated David Finlay in his NJPW debut match to win the IWGP Global Championship.
Nemeth used The Danger Zone (the renamed Zig Zag) to score a pinfall victory over Finlay in his first NJPW outing, ending Finlay's title reign with his first defense.
In the show's semi-main, Matt Riddle pinned Hiroshi Tanahashi after hitting a Bro Derek to win the NJPW World TV Championship.
The match was Riddle's first NJPW match on Japanese soil after joining the company earlier this year. He did wrestle a tag at Battle in the Valley in San Jose last month, and also worked two matches on joint RevPro/NJPW shows in London in 2017.
Tanahashi successfully defended the NJPW World TV title once in his 50-day reign at New Year Dash against Ryusuke Taguchi.
A new IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion was also crowned on Friday, as SHO defeated El Desperado to win the title in a countout finish. Desperado also managed one successful title defense in his 50-day reign.
SHO's Bullet Club House of Torture stablemate EVIL retained the NEVER Openweight Championship on Friday with a victory over Shota Umino to extend his title reign.
In the night's other title bout, Mayu Iwatani retained the IWGP Women's Championship with a win over Mina Shirakawa.
Night two of The New Beginning in Sapporo starts Friday night at 11:30 p.m. Eastern time. The show will feature Kazuchika Okada's NJPW farewell match, a Yota Tsuji vs. Yuya Uemura hair vs. hair battle, as well as Tetsuya Naito defending the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship against SANADA in the main event.
Our full report from night one is here.
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