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New Japan G1 Climax results and open thread for Saturday, August 1: Goto vs. Okada & more!

By Sean Rueter and Dave Walsh
New Japan on Instagram

Excitement continues to grow for one of the most thrilling events on the pro wrestling calendar, New Japan Pro Wrestling's G1 Climax.

This year's version, the 25th annual, will feature a 20 men competing across 19 dates - the most in history - for a spot in the finals on August 16. Each show will be broadcast worldwide on New Japan's streaming service, NJPW World. Here at Cageside, we'll have open threads & results for each show, so you can watch along with the best pro wrestling community on the internet.

A primer for the event can be found here; a full schedule, more information on how to watch and some predictions here.

The eighth day of action takes place at the Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium, and it's back to B Block, one of two groupings whose winner will go on to a spot in the finals.

And back to wondering what Nakamura's injury status is...

Satoshi Kojima vs. Yujiro Takahashi

Yuji Nagata vs. Karl Anderson

Tomoaki Honma vs. Michael Elgin

Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Tomohiro Ishii

Hirooki Goto vs. Kazuchika Okada

Enjoy the show!

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Day 8 Results:

Yujiro Takahashi pinned Satoshi Kojima in a match that went on for way too long and gave Takahashi far too much offense. The biggest problem with having Takahashi even in the G1 (other than him being there) is that they give him strange, long sequences where he's in control and the fans just don't care. Just about everyone was talking about how his valet was yet again not Mao. So yeah. Kojima is still able to go, for the most part, but Takahashi is just not on this level, scantily clad women in tow or not.

Karl Anderson pinned Yuji Nagata with the Gun Stun in a short, nothing match. I'm not a huge fan of Anderson and I'm always waiting for him to have a fabled "good match." This was not it, but also, Nagata is still heavily favoring his ribs from his injury last week. I'm pretty sure that Nagata is working pretty banged up right now and this is what we can expect from him. We got a few fun spots and the fans will always love Nagata. Anderson was mocking Nagata  throughout and eventually reversed the backdrop into the Gun Stun, which is how he beat Nagata in their last G1 encounter with a similar counter.

Michael Elgin defeated Tomoaki Honma with the Revolution Elgin Bomb. It's pretty difficult to have a bad match with Honma. In fact, it's pretty difficult to have anything but a very good match with Honma and that's exactly what this was. The fans so badly want to believe in Honma and every near fall is super tense because of it. Elgin did a great job being a monster here and everything he did looked like it hurt while still selling Honma's offense enough.

Shinsuke Nakanmura defeated Tomohiro Ishii with a Bomaye after a tremendous match. I don't like star ratings and there have been some really, really great matches in this G1 thus far, but this one is right up there with them. Both guys are the walking dead at this point, Shinsuke missing the last two shows due to an elbow injury and his arm was heavily taped here. This was just a match that was the epitome of strong style. Both guys were just beating the crap out of each other and there were some incredibly tense nearfalls.

Go out of your way to watch this match and marvel at these two insane dudes.

Hirooki Goto defeated Kazuchida Okada with the Shouten Kai. This was a pretty cool match that, like just about every Okada big match, had an amazing finishing sequence. Okada is the IWGP Heavyweight Champion and Goto is the IWGP Intercontinental Champion and, you know, Okada should have won. He didn't, though. A lot of tense stuff near the end until Goto hit the Shouten Kai for the pin and the crowd seemed pretty shocked.

That's that, Cagesiders. Thanks for joining us tonight and don't forget to follow me on the Twitter machine at @dvewlsh for lots of wrestling hot takes and my daily journey of doing nothing but complaining about writing.

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Current standings in Block A:

Bad Luck Fale 6
Tetsuya Naito 6
Katsuyori Shibata 6
Kota Ibushi 4
Togi Makabe 4
A.J. Styles 4
Hiroshi Tanahashi 4
Doc Gallows 2
Hiroyoshi Tenzan 2
Toru Yano 2

Current standings in Block B:

Tomohiro Ishii 6
Kazuchika Okada 6
Karl Anderson 6
Hirooki Goto 6
Michael Elgin 4
Shinsuke Nakamura 4
Yujiro Takahashi 4
Satoshi Kojima 2
Yuji Nagata 2
Tomoaki Honma 0

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