- Bat Yoshinaga & Tomoko Watanabe vs Saemi Numata & Akemi Torisu
Total squash by the Goku Wrecking Crew over the dream team of Torisu and the future Numatchi, 2 of my all time fave joshi flashes in the pan. Draged out a little too long as this didn't need to be nearly 15 mins but Bat killing Torisu is always fun, I think the biggest move Akemi got in the whole match was a clothesline. Doomsday flying smash gets broken up Torisu just kinda falling in the way so Watanabe bust out the jackhammer to kill little Numatchi for the win. No clue when it happened, wasn't in this match but I first noticed here that Watanabe had one of her front teeth busted out. Victory though guts and all that.
- Suzuka Minami, Rie Tamada & Cynthia Moreno vs Yumiko Hotta, Miori Kamiya & Kaoru Ito
Cool sprint, everyone hit everything perfectly and there were a lot of fun moments. Moreno mixing it up with Kamiya & Ito to start, rookie Tamada holding her own, spazzing out of folks with drop kicks, Ito & Kamiya taking advantage of being a regular team, tag partners on opposite coliding with Hotta going after Suzuka every time she gets. The last one is what ends up being the underlying focus of the match as it comes down to those 2 for the finish with Suzuka droping Hotta with a powerbomb. Nice to see a match whear lowest on the totem pole isn't the guaranteed jobber. Dug this a lot.
- Mima Shimoda & Debbie Malenko vs Etsuko Mita & Terri Power
"Everyone's going to have their work cut out for them in this one" - Debbie The Wise pre match. Crowd's all "ohhhh ahhhh" at Terri flexin her muscles. Deb calls her out to start and 30 seconds in they're blowing spots. There's a few more awkward moments in this including Terri droping an elbow rite on Deb's face that swelled up her cheek a little but aside from that Terri mostly did ok in this actually. She hit some athletic high spots like a rana and skinning the cat and didn't look 100% lost. Mita was all super extra spunky and fired up in this one, biting away and hurling chairs and what not. Her & Deb didn't work together too well either. After a badly timed move Debbie hits her with an Ace Crusher and Mita bangs her allready bad knee pretty hard coming down. Later on near the end they're both fighting up on top and slip with Mita getting her good leg caught in the ropes, messig that one up. Not her night. Once untangled she gets submitted to the STF from Ms Malenko. "Today's match was not exactly up to par, as good as what we normally do" - Debbie The Wise post match.
- (JGP 92) Sakie Hasegawa vs Mariko Yoshida
Battle of the walking wounderd, Yoshida comes in with both arms & her shoulder taped up while Sakie's still rocking the back brace and has both knees wraped up. Early portion of this is all about the awesome mat work and selling of attacks on said injuries. Sakie strikes first going after Yoshida's arm but things switch quickly with Mariko trying to destroy Sakie's bad leg in return all the while still selling her arm from earlier like a champ. Even lifting Sakie up for something simple like a slam causes her to wince in pain for a second. 10 mins in they start going to bigger moves. Yoshida changes her style up from "Ms. I will snap your leg" to "Ms. I will crush you with this tricked out lucha flying shit". Yoshida wipes out badly doing a suicide dive but it doesn't keep her down for long, a few minutes later she sends her outside again, fakes Sakie out then hits a sweet leaping springboard dive and much like last month the Kourakuen crowds is in love with them some Yoshida. Sakie makes her come back and goes into her spin kick barrage, gives Yoshida a bloody lip with a leaping one hitting her square in the mush. Since attempting to kick her head off fails, Sakie decides to crack it instead, droping her with a hurty looking back suplex that still doesn't get her the win. 20 mins in things sadly fall apart a little bit. Instead of building off the momentum they'd built up they go back to working the mat but don't put it over as strong as they did earlier so it just comes across flat and out of place this late in the match. It's like they knew they had to stall for time but ran out of shit to do before going to the finish sequence. Once they do make it to the home stretch things pick up again, lots of near falls off cradles, suplexes and the like. Big battle of drop kick vs spin kick in a cool moment. Sakie again spikes her with a back suplex but still just 2. Yoshida in charge a lot during the final min or 2, big german, step up diving head butt, flying elbow can't get her the victory. Time runs out and it's a 30 min draw. If they'd have kept this to 20 mins or had a better finish then going the distance this would have been a MOTYC, as it is it's still a really damn good match but a step below that lvl.
- (JGP 92) Aja Kong vs Bison Kimura
Added bonus, Debbie Malenko is in the booth doing commentary in english for the rest of the show. Soooooo remember in last years JGP these two met, beat the shit out of each other and then Bison riped apart Aja's bad ankle that she came into the match with and made her submit? Aja does and revenge is a bitch. This year they upped the violence, a few minutes in Bison has a bloody mouth and is bleeding hard way from getting head butted. Bison gives as good as she gets though, atleast when given the chance and this is one of the stiffer matches i've ever seen in joshi. Everything from kicks to chops to chair swinging, metal tossing crowd brawls is done with extra intensity. No one's safe either as ring atendants, the ref and who ever else gets in their way takes a beating during this. Aja dominates more often then not though and ocasionally would take a minute to lock in a hold or 2 or bust out a flying shoulder block or dropkick in between the beating whear as Bison's the more crazy of the pair and will just beat you down and then beat you down some more. By the end of this Bison's lost a front tooth, I think from a punt to the jaw mid match. She survives a couple of urakens near the end so Aja choke slams her nearly to hell then locks in a cross arm breaker for the insta tap, Aja flashes back to 91 and holds on a few extra seconds before being drug off. "God made the devil just for fun, but when he wanted the real thing he made Aja Kong" - Book of Shishido Chapter 1970 verse 925. It's all in the family though, Aja tends to her fallen team mate post match, helps her up and they hug. Aja screams at her to make it to the finals so they can meet again. Big Kimura chant from the fans. Great match if you're into the hard hitting, smash mouth (no pun intended) style. One of the best of the year.
- Bull Nakano & Akira Hokuto vs Takako Inoue & Kyoko Inoue
Best I can tell this is the first time W-Inoue teamed up together not counting a 6 woman tag in 89. Soooooo remember 3 months ago when Hokuto crushed Takako like a bug in a few short minutes? "Takako's going to be a handicap" says Debbie the Wise. Story of the match is pretty much a repeat of that. Bull & Hokuto beat the dog crap out of Takako, though the english commentary we learn that Bull's talking crap to her while doing it to boot. Egging her on to put up more of a fight and not be such a loser. Kyoko on the other hand beat Hokuto the last time they met in singles and while she's never beaten Bull she has always held her own against her. Here though things don't go so well, Kyoko gets some good shots in but there's no way she can't fight off both of them alone and it proves too much as she largely gets her ass kicked here as well. "You can tell this isn't a tough match for Bull, her hairs not even messed up yet" says Fumi Saito(?), the bi lingual commentator who's always on these shows and is translating for Debbie. Takako is able to break up a few near pin falls but that's about all she's good for during the home stretch. Hokuto drops Kyoko with the NLB and she breaks that up so Hokuto gives Takako one of her own while Bull drops the leg on Kyoko and we get a double pin to complete the humiliation and destruction of W-Inoue on this fine night. They really put this over as Kyoko failing because she had such a weak partner though. So the coolest ass whoping glorified squash ever. Loved this quite a lot.
- (No Time Limit) Manami Toyota vs Toshiyo Yamada
12/9/89 30 minute draw, 9/7/91 30 minute draw, 1/4/92 40 minute draw and so it comes to this, no time limit, main event, there must be a winner. Funny moment on commentary as Fumi remarks "So the male fans will be more for Toyota OF COURSE, while the wrestling fans will be more for Yamada" and Debbie craps all over his theory in a polite manner saying how great Toyota is in the ring so the "wrestling" fans will be split too. Match starts at a really fast pace as Toyota immediatly gets the rolling cradle but then things slow down for a while, they go back and forth with no one having the advantage for too long. Yamada attacks the leg but it doesn't go anywhear and after Toyota catches her foot mid kick she locks in a leg bar and turns the time. Yamada gets the ropes but she won't break, they roll outside to the floor with the hold still on and Toyota still won't break for a while. Once she does Toyota hurls her through the 1st 4 rows of chairs. Back in the ring, Toyota tries to turn it into more her style of match, hitting a billion drop kicks from all angles but Yamada shuts that shit down with a couple kicks to the head and starts stretching her on the mat. Anouncers make mention of something I noticed in their last match, that Yamada doesn't really have a lot of big moves in her arsenal though they do play up that what Yamada does do, while simpler is really effective. She'll just kick your head in essentially. Debbie also name drops Lex Luger and compares one for the moves Yamada does to the torture rack, so so wish they'd have put her in the booth more often. Toyota gets sick of playing human kick bag and hauls off and punches Yamada upside the head. Match goes outside and Toyota goes splat on a missed dive attempt, taking out a young girl working ring duty. Yamada hits a leaping spin kick off the apron to follow up. Back inside match turns back into a sprint, lot of superplexes and other big moves getting tossed out now. Yamada's working this a lot more aggressive then she did back in January, staying on Toyota with a lot more fury. No stalling for time, hesitation or confusion her part this time. Yamada with the dragon suplex can't get it, Toyota with 3 germans can't get it. Back outside again Toyota with the fucking insane spring board moonsault off the middle of the top rope nearly landing face first on the apron on the way down but she survives. Anouncers bringing up that a lot of Toyota's flashy shit doesn't always register as well with the fans because she does it so effortlessly and fast in an interesting point. Debbie's also pushing heavily how well these 2 know each other being tag partners so they can predict what the other's about to do and that's what becomes the story for the final part of the match. Lots more counter spots, back and forth, Toyota goes for another moonsault but eats knee. Yamada with a series of diving brain kicks for 2. Toyota hitting crazy ass suplexes i've never even seen before but just getting 2. She finally decideds to pull out the JOCS but Yamada has that shit scouted, she escapes and counters with a similar move of her own and FINALLY gets the win over her eternal rival & friend. Awesome match, easily their best yet up to this point. Fans who for the most part hadn't been cheering on either one over the other erupt in a giant Yamada chant to celebrate her victory. Manami Toyota doesn't let her long time tag partner and BFF have her moment in the sun for long though, there's no hug, there's no handshake, Toyota is not a gracious loser. 4 matches, 126+ minutes, spread out over almost 3 years to get a winner in a singles match between these 2 and Toyota can not stand that it's not her so she snaps. She gets on the mic in near tears and challenges Yamada for 1 more match and tells her not only will she put up her IWA title this time time, she'll also put her hair on the line as well. Yamada excepts and we've got hair vs hair.
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