Fuji carried the match. He kept it basic, but also kept it moving so it was rarely dull. Unfortunately, it looked very indyish. This is acceptable for Mukai since he's still fairly experienced, but after all these years Fuji should be able to do better with an opponent that tries hard and is generally passable like Mukai. They didn't make too many mistakes, but most of the spots they used are executed by whoever else you see doing them. The speed, precision, and crispness simply weren't there. Fuji pinned Mukai with a DDT, which they call 9999. After the match, he did a Michaels like performance, dancing around and showing his ass.

7:00

Rating:

 

Flying Kid Ichihara vs. Masked Sumo

God awful! Sumo is like a cross between Yokozuna & Arashi. Almost every move was either botched or poorly executed. Thankfully, Ichihara got a flash pin with la magistral in just over a minute. Prior to this debacle, Ichihara introduced his new manager, Kurumi Shirohara. She looks old enough to be Sena's grandmother.

1:05

Rating:

 

Shinjuku Same & Azusa Kudo & Naohiro Yamazaki vs. Tomokazu Morita & Satoru Makita & Yoshihito Sasaki

The rookies are all well conditioned, fairly athletic juniors. Their matches thus far are incredibly basic, so it's hard to say if they have much potential. Yamazaki is the best of these six. Athough that's faint praise, he has been getting a little better. The first 9 minutes were pretty boring, but the pace picked up for the last 4+. Aside from the typically pathetic "boxing" displays by Same, the match wasn't flawed. It just wasn't very interesting.

13:09

Rating:

 

Hisakatsu Oya vs. Arvan Ken

A fairly solid match due to Oya, but very uneventful. Ken is a Battlarts guy that uses looks like he'd hang around with Masao Orihara. He employs a mat style that is similar to Yuki Ishikawa's even though he's with Kuroda's heel group here. The match was fairly even. There were very few big moves or catches, and neither man was every really in trouble. Essentially, the match just ended. Ken had landed on his feet for Oya's "brainbuster," but Oya cut him off with a running neckbreaker drop and put him away with his backdrop finisher.

7:11

Rating:

 

Kyoko Inoue & Emi Motokawa vs. Etsuko Mita & Mima Shimoda

Pretty much what you'd expect from LCO in terms of style and their performances. It was sloppier and more contrived due to the opposition, taking the match down a notch or more likely two from normal Cachorras level. Kyoko wasn't very impressive here, she seemed slow and mainly used lariats. Emi did all the work for her team. She brought a lot of energy to the match and certainly worked very hard. She hasn't had the opportunity to work with LCO much, and that became obvious from time to time. The finish saw Kyoko try to save Emi from Mita's Death Valley bomb, but Mita saw it coming and moved Emi into the path of Kyoko's lariat. Kyoko was embarrassed that she took her partner out. While she was appologizing, Shimoda grabbed her and Mita pulled Emi up and Death Valley bombed her for the win.

16:15

Rating:

 

WEW Hardcore Tag Senshuken: GOEMON & Onryo vs. Kintaro Kanemura & Ryuji Yamakawa

A pleasant surprise that was clearly the best match on the show. Some great action in this sprint. It basically consisted of spots that look good. It wasn't too gimmick oriented. I mean, they used tables and chairs, but for the most part only to visually enhance wrestling moves. Not surprisingly, this was not the match to look to for selling or logic. Actually, none of the matches on this show were, so we may as well get a fast pace and some nifty spots. Execution wasn't a problem, which hasn't exactly been the trademark of Kanemura's matches in recent times. Being spotted in a shorter match probably made a difference because he was reminiscent of the Kanemura of 5 years ago. Onryo stole the show here with his workrate and athleticism. He did three dives, including putting Kanemura through a table with a a body press off the top to the floor moments after GOEMON had done the same to Yamakawa. He also turned Kanemura's super powerbomb into a nadare shiki no Frankensteiner. Onryo invented a new way to avoid being pinned, catching the refs hand before it hits the mat for three. It's amazing that even in a match that didn't have a lot of moves you'd call great, the "2nd best wrestling move" now that someone in the WWF finally started using it, the swanton bomb (done by GOEMON), wasn't one of the 5 best moves in the match. Nice near falls at the end leading to Yamakawa pinning Onryo with his reverse Tigerdriver to take the titles. Too bad the match didn't last another 3 minutes.

11:45

Rating:

 

Kodo Fuyuki & The Great Sasuke vs. Tetsuhiro Kuroda & Mammoth Sasaki

Sasuke looked really fast against this opposition. He had some nice moments, and worked well with Fuyuki on the few occassions they had the chance to double team. Most of the match saw Team Kuroda beat on Sasuke, in particular his left knee. They were able to do this because Team Kuroda put Fuyuki in a coffin and had Ken sit on it so he couldn't get out. They opened it once so the wrong Kudo could kiss Fuyuki, but essentially Fuyuki was not involved during the 2nd half until the very end. This wasn't meant to be the most exciting match, and probably didn't generate the heat they would have liked, but Team Kuroda needed to dominate because they need credibility (they have no one behind Kuroda) and it lessed the blow of losing in the end. It didn't make for the most exciting. Sasuke finally came back at 17, but Team Kuroda must have taken out the ref off camera because he was kneeling on the floor when Sasuke needed him to count a fall. Sasuke proceeded to ascend to the top rope, but Same pushed him off then the rest of Team 2000 put the boots to him. This lead to Hayabusa coming out to save the day. His right ankle was obviously bothering him, and caused him to slip off the top rope when he was trying to make his grand entrance with a diving lariat. Hayabusa took all the Team Kuroda members that weren't in the match would with strikes then gave Sasaki a quebrada. Kuroda tried to lariat Hayabusa when he was reentering the ring, but Hayabusa blocked it and gave him a high kick. This sent Kuroda reeling into Fuyuki, who had finally escaped the coffin (probably because there was no one left to hold it down). Fuyuki hit Kuroda with the lid of the coffin then Sasuke small packaged Kuroda for the win. Sasuke got a measure of revenge for the terrorist attack where Kuroda stripped him naked and set up the main event for the 3/5 PPV (which Kuroda won) without Kuroda really being beaten by Sasuke. Not a great match by any means, but it did it's job when it came to moving the top program forward.

18:35

Rating: