The 5 Best (& 5 Most Disappointing) IWGP Intercontinental Title Matches

Established in 2011, the IWGP Intercontinental Championship is the secondary title of New Japan Pro Wrestling, behind the IWGP Heavyweight Championship. Noted for having a white strap instead of the standard black strap that the other IWGP Titles bear, it was traditionally a midcard title until Shinsuke Nakamura won it, making the Championship so popular that an IC Title once main eventedWrestle Kingdom over the Heavyweight Title!

To give a quick overview of the title, this will show which matches were the best IWGP Intercontinental Title bouts, and which ones turned out to be a disappointment.

10 Best: Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Kenny Omega (The New Beginning in Sapporo Night 1, 2/14/2016)

NJPW Ace Hiroshi Tanahashi isn’t synonymous with the IWGP Intercontinental Championship by any means, but he’s had a couple of reigns with the title. After Shinsuke Nakamura vacated the belt and hopped over to WWE, Tanahashi and Kenny Omega fought for it in a nearly 30-minute classic that kickstarted the transformation of Omega -- who had just taken over leadership of the Bullet Club from AJ Styles -- from “The Cleaner” into the “Best Bout Machine.”

9 Disappointing: La Sombra (c) vs. Shinsuke Nakamura

Shinsuke Nakamura held the IC Title for a record 313 days when he took on La Sombra in a Two-Out-of-Three Falls Match for Mexican partner promotion CMLL and shockingly lost. La Sombra -- later known as Andrade “Cien” Almas in WWE -- held the title for about a month, successfully defending it once against Volador Jr., but lost it back to Nakamura in Japan. The match was surprisingly short at less than 15 minutes, and extra disappointing because La Sombra came off as a mere pit stop between Nakamura title reigns.

8 Best: Kota Ibushi (c) vs. Tetsuya Naito (Dominion, 6/9/2019)

The only thing Kota Ibushi loves more than Kenny Omega is professional wrestling. Only someone who truly loves wrestling would fall on his neck so much. Ibushi and Tetsuya Naito have great chemistry as competitors, and the usual fan-favorite tweener Naito manages to get the crowd to boo him.

This one is more than a mere title defense, it’s an emotional affair that hits the ground running and achieves such an intensity thanks to an accidental neck bump that so obviously went wrong that it made many fans fear for Ibushi’s life, much less his career. Miraculously, he turned out okay.

7 Disappointing: MVP vs. Toru Yano (Invasion Tour 2011: Attack On East Coast Day 3, 5/15/2011)

DID YOU KNOW: Montel Vontavious Porter was the very first IWGP Intercontinental Champion? In 2011, NJPW did a brief tour of the US East Coast and held a tournament to crown the first IC Champ that concluded with a match at the ECW Arena between MVP and perennial cheater/DVD salesman Toru Yano. While parts of that sound impressive, the bout felt more like an indie show held in a high school gym as Yano stalled a whole lot and MVP performed his signature moves to scattered applause and small doses of Philly wrestling fan hostility.

6 Best: Shinsuke Nakamura (c) vs. AJ Styles (Wrestle Kingdom 10, 1/4/2016)

CHAOS member Shinsuke Nakamura and Bullet Club leader AJ Styles met for the first time -- one-on-one, that is -- in a dream match at the Tokyo Dome in what would be their final singles bouts for NJPW before departing for WWE. It’s a methodical match that begins with a lot of grappling, building to the Strong Style battle of strikes that makes it a classic. It’s a match so good that WWE basically tried to repeat it as a WrestleMania match.

5 Disappointing: Tetsuya Naito (c) vs. Jay Lethal (Power Struggle, 11/5/2016)

This Power Struggle main event match was supposed to be a title defense against Michael Elgin, but he suffered an unfortunate injury so NJPW had to cook up a quick storyline where Tetsuya Naito’s Los Ingobernables de Japon turned on Jay Lethal to set up a feud. Naito and the ROH veteran did their best given the circumstances but faced an uphill battle wrestling a match with a predictable ending in front of a crowd that wasn’t too familiar with or excited for Jay Lethal.

4 Best: Shinsuke Nakamura (c) vs. Kota Ibushi (Wrestle Kingdom 9, 1/4/2015)

In 2015, former Junior Heavyweight Kota Ibushi graduated to the Heavyweight status and challenged Shinsuke Nakamura for the Intercontinental Championship at the Tokyo Dome, resulting in a match many fans consider one of NJPW’s best bouts of all time.

Ibushi, desperate to prove himself to one of his idols and the wrestler most synonymous with the IC Title, takes a very aggressive “kill your idols” approach to Nakamura, leading to a battle full of stiff strikes that lives up to its reputation.

3 Disappointing: Hiroshi Tanahashi (c) vs. Jay White (Wrestle Kingdom 12, 1/4/2018)

Young Lion Jay White returned from his excursion in Ring of Honor to make his NJPW main roster debut in 2017 as “Switchblade” Jay White. He immediately started a feud with Hiroshi Tanahashi, leading to his first match being for the Intercontinental Title at the Tokyo Dome. The match itself is surprisingly underwhelming as the newcomer White mostly did limb work on Tanahashi, who wasn’t wrestling at 100% anyway, possibly due to a real injury. Tanahashi winning didn’t make White look any better, either.

2 Best: Tetsuya Naito (c) vs. Kazuchika Okada (Wrestle Kingdom 14, 1/5/2020)

It’s difficult to think of a bigger or better IWGP Intercontinental Title match. Having won the IC title from Jay White on Night 1 of Wrestle Kingdom 14, Naito faced a second test: The Double Gold Dash, a winner-take-all match against IWGP Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada. It was the culmination of several years of story for Naito and an intense 35-minute bout against the source of one of his biggest professional failures in front of a crowd that didn’t care about him until he turned evil. It more than delivered.

1 Disappointing: Hiroshi Tanahashi (c) vs. Billy Gunn (G1 Special in USA Night 2, 7/2/2017)

More of a curiosity than a must-see match, Tanahashi personally chose Billy Gunn as a challenger to his IC Title during that brief period when Mr. Ass toured with New Japan as a member of Yoshitatsu’s anti-Bullet Club stable Hunter Club. The result was a match that wasn’t as fun as it sounded that basically operated as a cool-down for the tournament final to crown the first IWGP US Champion. At one point, however, Gunn lives up to his old nickname by pulling down Tanahashi’s tights, revealing his butt to the crowd.

Next: NJPW: The 5 Best (& 5 Most Disappointing) IWGP Intercontinental Champions