Top 10 best NJPW matches of 2021 so far

#5 Shingo Takagi vs. Jeff Cobb for the NEVER Openweight Championship (NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 15 Day 2)

Hey Shingo... you can run, but eventually I’ll catch you..... wanna fight? pic.twitter.com/cvDMgI93eg

— Jeff Cobb (@RealJeffCobb) December 11, 2020

Shingo Takagi is not just one of the best wrestlers in NJPW, he's also arguably the most prolific big match performer in all of wrestling in 2021. This was proved yet again at Wrestle Kingdom 15 Day 2, where he met the biggest challenge of his career with The United Empire's Jeff Cobb.

Cobb had been making his name as the enforcer of his stable and looked to win his first singles gold in NJPW on the grand stage at the Tokyo Dome. Takagi elevated the NEVER Openweight Championship through a hard-hitting series of matches against Minoru Suzuki in 2020. Jeff Cobb looked to capitalize on the added prestige and win the title at the biggest show of the year.

Shingo Takagi emerges from Wrestle Kingdom war with Jeff Cobb, retains NEVER title: https://t.co/JnqPvdzoNm #njpw #njwk15 #wk15day2 pic.twitter.com/DcjkX5YPKh

— NJPW Global (@njpwglobal) January 5, 2021

It was a banger of a match! Cobb pulled out all the stops and showed off his entire arsenal. He hit a sit-out Razor Edge and a variety of suplexes, but could not put Takagi away. The highlight of this NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 15 contest was Shingo reversing Cobb's Tour of the Islands into a moonsault fallaway slam.

Takagi nailed Cobb with a lariat and followed it with Last of the Dragon to pick up the win. The two men knocked the bricks out of one another in a heavyweight slugfest unlike anything seen in NJPW in quite some time. The crowd was fully invested, adding to the atmosphere. This was a star-making performance from Jeff Cobb.