Puroresu Show Reviews

Kento Miyahara Debut Match ~ A New Dream: Kento Miyahara vs Seiya Sanada
Kensuke Office rookie vs All Japan rookie. Good new blood match, but I felt it went a little too long. Sanada wins with a high-angle Boston crab after hitting a high-angle backbreaker.

Takashi Okita Debut Match ~ A New Dream: Takashi Okita VS Takeshi Minaminao
Minaminao is an Ultimo Dragon student, and Okita is an ex-American football player. This one also felt like it went longer than necessary with Minaminao finally putting away the rookie with a Swanton bomb.

Catfish Yume no Holy Land: Catfishman, Catfishman & Catfishman VS Kikutaro, Magnitude Kishiwada & Boso Boy Raito
Fun little comedy match with these bizzare Catfishmen. Nothing much really stood out for me in this one.

Katsuhiko Nakajima Return Match ~ Future Dream First Confrontation: Katsuhiko Nakajima VS Ryuji Yamaguchi
Fun cometitive match between the returning Nakajima and rookie Yamaguchi. These two folded each other in half several times with backdrops and Germans before Nakajima hit a moonsault press to take the match.
Match Rating: *1/2

Under the Name of Dream: Kensuke Sasaki, Genichiro Tenryu, Yoshihiro Takayama & Minoru Suzuki VS Shinjiro Ohtani, Yutaka Yoshie, Akitoshi Saito & Toshiaki Kawada
A fun all star main event where everyone got to hit their spots. They even teased Suzuki heeling Kensuke when he broke up a cover Kensuke had on Ohtani! There were a lot of fun strike exchanges too and I really loved Tenryu acting like he broke his hand when he smacked Kawada on the cheek with a guh punch! Finish came with Tenryu hitting the 53-Years Old on Saito, followed by a Northern Lights Bomb from Kensuke and the Everast German Suplex-hold by Takayama for the win.
Match Rating: ***1/2

Michiyoshi Ohara and Tatsutoshi Gotoh attacked Kensuke after the match. Where were all of Kensuke's friends then?

Overall: Fun show and worth a look for the two main events.

Labels: AJPW, Kensuke Office, NJPW, NOAH, Zero-1 MAX

Akihiko Ito & Genba Hirayanagi VS Takashi Okita & Kento Miyahara
Ito and Miyahara have been developing a bit of a rivalry through out the tour, and this was the climax of it for now. Good showing from the rookies of both sides, and Ito avenges a previous loss pinning Miyahara here with a German suplex.

Kishin Kawabata, Kentaro Shiga & Tsuyoshi Kikuchi VS Masao Inoue, Junji Izumuda & Mitsuo Momota
Standard mid-card fare. Kikuchi pins Momota with a roll-up.

Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Taiji Ishimori VS Bryan Danielson & Atsushi Aoki
Interesting thing about this match was that Kanemaru turned on his partner here since they’ve been feuding for a while now anyway. Despite the assist from Kanemaru, Danielson & Aoki still weren’t able to put Ishimori away and Ishimori beat Aoki with a sick cradle DDT.

Akira Taue, Kotaro Suzuki & Ricky Marvin VS D-Lo Brown, Buchanan & Bobby Fish
I hope D-Lo enjoys being an enhancement talent in WWE, cause it’s such a waste of his talents considering the push NOAH was giving him. Would you rather work for a company that pushed you as a legitimate monster foreigner, even getting to no-sell for KOBASHI, or would you rather be dropping falls in 2-minute matches to put over a lot less talented workers?
Rant aside, a fun match with the main story being Marvin trying to take on the bigger foreigners. Fun back and forth closing moments, with D-Lo finally hitting the Lo-Down on Marvin for the win.

Kenta Kobashi, Tamon Honda & KENTA VS Yoshihiro Takayama, Takuma Sano & Go Shiozaki
Takayama bring Shiozaki over to the dark side and watch the fun ensue when Shiozaki takes on his mentor Kobashi! What we get here is a taste of the awesomeness that’s in store when Kobashi and Shiozaki finally collide some time down the line. Both delivered stiff-ass chops with the crowd eating it all up wanting to see Go beat Kobashi! Takayama and Kobashi’s rivalry also heated up pretty good here, as they brawled and had to be pulled apart after the match even.
KENTA got some good shots in on Takayama as well, as you know he’s still looking to beat the bigger striker. The only person in the match that seemed like an after thought was Honda, who ultimately dropped the fall to Sano in the end.
Match Rating: ***3/4

Global Tag League: Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura VS Takeshi Morishima & Mohammed Yone
Current GHC tag champions versus the former GHC tag champions, and the match also served the purpose of building up Sugiura to get a GHC heavyweight championship match against Morishima when he pinned him here after dropping him on his head twice with the Olympic Slam! Other than that, it was see-saw match with a lot of great back and forth action that could have easily gone to a time limit draw.
Match Rating: ****
See Match Higlights: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1OTrZ7ICFQ

Global Tag League: Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikioh VS Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima
The former unbeaten GHC tag champions take on the pride of the Kensuke Office, with awesome results! Mostly due to the fire Nakajima brings to his matches, especially when playing the underdog to two bigger guys like Akiyama and Rikioh. Current AJPW Triple Crown champion Kensuke matched brawn and power with Akiyama and Rikioh, and the crowd erupted for him pinning former GHC champion Rikioh with the Northern Lights Bomb.
Match Rating: ***1/2
See Match Highlights: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEzEe2OyGEw

Global Tag League: Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa VS Akitoshi Saito & Bison Smith
Nobody in their right mind expected Saito and Bison to win this, but that’s exactly what happened, and it surprised everyone when Saito was able to pin Ogawa with the Sickle of Death enzuguiri. Not really a great match per-say, as they could have done more to build up the finish since Misawa/Ogawa didn’t get many near falls on Bison/Saito to make the fans believe that the underdogs had a chance rather than just have them dominate the ending and add a bit of drama.
Match Rating: ***

Overall: This was a very good show from front to back, capped off with a load of great tag matches.

Labels: NOAH