Karl Anderson's NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 17 Match Official Following Win Over Hikuleo

New Japan Pro-Wrestling have made Karl Anderson's match at Wrestle Kingdom 17 official.

Machine Gun KA returned to NJPW at today's World Tag League and Super Junior Tag League finals to defend the NEVER Openweight Championship against Hikuleo. The match was originally scheduled to take place on November 5 at Battle Autumn but Anderson was double booked, instead performing for WWE at Crown Jewel in Saudi Arabia.

In a somewhat surprising result, Anderson defeated Hikuleo, countering a Chokeslam into the Gun Stun for the victory. Machine Gun then cut a promo after the match, proclaiming himself as the greatest NEVER Openweight Champion in New Japan history. This brought out Tama Tonga and things quickly broke down into a brawl, with KA standing tall after hitting the Gun Stun on his former faction-mate.

Anderson then announced that he will face Tama Tonga for the NEVER Openweight Championship at Wrestle Kingdom 17 inside the Tokyo Dome on January 4.

KA and Tonga were previously stablemates in Bullet Club but Tama and his brother Tanga Loa were kicked out of the faction in February by The Good Brothers and Jay White. Anderson then defeated Tonga to win the NEVER Openweight Title at Dominion in June.

During his reign, Anderson has successfully defended the belt against Hiroshi Tanahashi. He and Luke Gallows then returned to WWE a couple of weeks later, reforming The OC with AJ Styles. Mia Yim has since joined the stable.