8/6/2025

© New Japan Pro Wrestling

New Japan Pro Wrestling

G1 Diary- Nights 1-6

Night 1 of the G1 CLIMAX took place in Sapporo. Hokkaido has been the traditional opening spot for the tour for much of the past decade but was unavailable last year due to building renovations. With those completed, it was back to their standard start.

Opening up proceedings were Shingo Takagi and YOSHI-HASHI. The latter had to earn his spot in the tournament through the qualifiers, and he carried that form into the match, dispatching Shingo with a counter into a crucifix bomb after Takagi had attempted to set up a Last of the Dragon. The crowd, who were more behind YOSHI-HASHI for the duration of the short match, were happy to see him win, just as much as Shingo was frustrated about the result.

A Block opened with EVIL winning his opening match for the fifth year in a row, after he was assisted by Dick Togo and a returning Don Fale in order to get a submission win over Callum Newman. Also in the winners column was Drilla Maloney, who gained his first win in his first tournament by hitting a Drilla Killa on Great-O-Khan and Yuya Uemura, whose mix of styles with NEVER Champion Oleg Boltin led to the first good match of the night. It was Uemura’s technical skills that won out, allowing him to pin Boltin after a deadbolt suplex.

This card was all singles matches, with the next one up being Shota Umino besting ELP in a completely passable affair, before the card picked up for David Finlay vs Ryohei Oiwa. This was another clash of styles, but also experience, as Finlay tried to overcome Oiwa’s strength through his own cleverness. Finlay kept control for most of the match before a small mistake left him open to the Grip, and Oiwa picked up the two points.

The match of the night was up next, and it was the match you would have expected to be on paper. Konosuke Takeshita versus Gabe Kidd was a brutal, hard hitting affair that ran at a thunderous pace from the very start, with Takeshita trying to control the feisty Brit who repeatedly rallied well. Takeshita’s barrage of offense eventually became too much for the Global Champion, who eventually succumbed to a sleeper.

This will end up on many fans’ match of the tournament lists, but came at a cost, as an accidental landing of Takeshita onto Gabe Kidd’s knee led to him suffering a hyper extension.  

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Yota Tsuji defeated SANADA in a decent affair before the opening night offered up a substantial shock. New IWGP World Heavyweight Champion Zack Sabre Jr was wrestling Ren Narita in what was expected to be a straight forward opening to his tournament. He was in full “dickhead” mode as the match began, and it was an interesting open to go against a House of Torture member at the start. Zack seemed like he was in complete control until Narita bit his calf. This distracted the champion, leaving Narita open to hit a Souled Out and a Hell’s guillotine to get what was an unbelievable win. The crowd was almost as stunned as I was. Narita’s win meant that all of the Reiwa men got wins on the opening night.

The main event saw Hiroshi Tanahashi wrestling in his final G1 Tournament against local favourite Taichi, who took his place in A Block in a second chance gauntlet in the qualifiers after an “injury” to Hirooki Goto. This was a spirited affair where the crowd were willing to overlook Tanahashi’s mobility issues and Taichi did his best to make things work.

Ironically, it was Taichi’s knee that gave out and prevented him from getting the win on this occasion, with three High Fly Flows leading Tanahashi to victory.

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Night 2 also took place in Sapporo as more of the stories for the tournament began to play out. YOSHI-HASHI continued to be the man with early momentum, surviving all of Ren Narita’s tricks to obtain another two points, and he was matched by G1 new boy Drilla Maloney, who put down Shota Umino.

This was another ten match singles card that saw EVIL also move to an assisted 2-0 record as he overcame Yota Tsuji, whilst ELP continued his series with Konosuke Takeshita this year by finally getting a win (he needed a number of piledrivers to do so) in a great match. Taichi continued to sell the knee he hurt against Hiroshi Tanahashi, making it an active target for Yuya Uemura; it was veteran craftiness that saw master escape student on this occasion, though.

The unexpected cause of curiosity for day two was SANADA, who is trying everything to find himself right now, including going for some rather interesting outfits. In the words of U2, he still hasn’t found what he is looking for as of yet, and it cost him his match with David Finlay.

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Night 3 of the tour moved to Sendai for the first single block night of the tour. A Block action meant that SANADA did not have long to stew over his defeat to Finlay the previous day, as he would meet fellow Horse of Torture member and former long term tag partner EVIL on night 3. If SANADA had wondered where the rest of the faction’s loyalty lay, he learnt very quickly it wasn’t with him, as the heel tactics were all to benefit EVIL. No sense of self and no friends is not a great place to be.

Things were looking bleak for SANADA until someone stepped up. Yoshinobu Kanemaru, a House of Torture stablemate who was also with him in Just 5 Guys stepped into his corner to help even things up. It was the boost SANADA needed, helping him to avoid the patented EVIL low blow and roll him up for his first victory of the tournament, whilst also inflicting EVIL’s first loss.

The main match of the night was a rematch from last year’s G1, that saw Yuya Uemura defeat Yota Tsuji, but at some cost. Uemura had torn his triceps in the match, leading to a spell on the sidelines. This bout was stronger than the injury plagued meeting as well as their “Wrestle Kingdom” match, showing that both are growing into the role of putting big matches together without a senior to guide them.

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Niigata was the host of Night 4 and the first solo night for B Block. Tournament matches on this card were reduced to four after Gabe Kidd was forced to forfeit another match, this time to Shingo Takagi, whose losing streak opening the tournament was ended in an unfulfilling way. This could not be avoided, though, and it was clear a decision needed to be made sooner rather than later on Gabe’s participation in the rest of the tournament.

One man who is enjoying his tournament so far is YOSHI-HASHI. The former tag champion took the lead in the block after karma saw him see off Drilla Maloney, who was also 2-0 coming in. There was also a win for Konosuke Takeshita over Great O-Khan, where Takeshita had to fight from underneath for a change, having had his neck damaged at the hands of O-Khan’s Iron Claw during a post match attack after their tag match the day before.

The main event was a rematch from the main event of this year’s Tokyo Dome, as Shota Umino took on Zack Sabre Jr. If you hated that match then the good news is this one was much better and much tighter, with Umino showing more fire against the little bully that is Sabre Jr’s current character. It was a second chapter that gave Umino the win and likely set up another IWGP Title match between the pair going into the autumn.

© New Japan Pro Wrestling

The tour made its way to Tokyo for Night 5 and a much discussed evening in Ota Gymnasium, where fans and wrestlers spoke more about the lack of crowd than they did the show for large parts of it. The other bad news happened at the very start of the show, as Gabe Kidd came out to address the crowd and confirmed that he was withdrawing from this year’s tournament. Kidd promised to return as the best version of himself that anyone had ever seen.

There was another clash of technical versus speed on night 5, as Yuya Uemura met Callum Newman. Uemura carried on his quest for arms in this tournament, and he took out another here, as his weakening of the joint meant Newman’s offense was limited and that he became another victim of a deadbolt suplex.

The main event saw Hiroshi Tanahashi claim his 99th win in the G1, defeating David Finlay with a flash pin after the Irishman had been in control for most of the contest. Tanahashi thanked the crowd after and played a little air guitar, as his hope for the future, young lion Aaron Wolf, looked on. You can’t call Tanahashi’s performances so far in this tournament classics in any way, but they show a lot of heart and are still far above what most have expected given other recent performances prior to the tournament.

© New Japan Pro Wrestling

Night 6 also came from Ota, as B Block continued in a 4 match format, with Gabe Kidd’s remaining matches forfeited rather than completed by a replacement.

If there is a theme to the main events on this tour, it would be them outperforming the previous matches between the two participants, and this was another one as Shingo Takagi and Konosuke Takeshita blew their Tokyo Dome effort from January 4th completely out of the water.

Both are incredible mixes of power and speed with the ability to change the pace of a match in seconds, and this was fully on display here, as the match built to an incredible finish that had Ota City Gymnasium going insane. The two threw the kitchen sink at each other, in what felt like the ultimate game of one-upmanship. It was ferocious; you couldn’t take your eyes off it and it came with a dramatic finish as Shingo Takagi ended up caught in a rear naked chickenwing. Takagi kept fighting but he couldn’t escape and the referee declared Takeshita the victor.

If you watch one match from the first week of the G1, then let it be this one.

© New Japan Pro Wrestling

New Japan News

Concerns about the routing of this year’s G1 Tournament are proving to be well founded so far, as the attendance story has threatened to overrun a tournament which has achieved above expectations so far in regards to match quality and stories being told. It has also avoided the parity booking so far that dogged this year’s Best of the Super Juniors.

Attendance for the opening eight nights has totalled 15,470, down only marginally from last year’s 16,087 (-3.8%), with an average attendance for each show of 1,934, but the market comparison is where the actual picture is being told.

The G1 returned to opening in Hokkaido this summer, having had to move the first tournament weekend to Osaka last year due to building renovations. Opening weekend drew 5,099, down 15% from the opening weekend in 2023. The following date in Sendai was down 35% on last year and Nagaoka drew a disastrous number, not just 49% down on the Block Finals last year at 1,547, but lower than the half capacity, clap crowd in the city back in 2020.

Pictures of the crowd at Ota Gymnasium on July 25th were widely discussed online and the attendance also by the talent, with many feeling that the Friday night show would have been much better suited to Korakuen Hall than Ota, which requires far more travel to reach on a workday than its more central counterpart. A single night at Ota may have boosted the Saturday number of 2,250 as well, which was just short of the 2023 number at the venue of 2,316. The 2023 show was also a weekday show, but the number was still seen as disappointing with Okada-Ospreay the main event match on that night.

Nagoya was the first show where a smaller venue than what we gave traditionally seen for a G1 is in use, this time due to the closure of the Aichi Prefectural Gymnasium. The last action in the arena, a sumo basho, closed on the same day as this show. These are all factors which led to the Nagoya show drawing 2,162 as opposed to last year’s 3,205. Rounding out the opening eight was Suita in Osaka, which was down to 1,300, from 1,711 last year.

New Japan will be hoping that Tanahashi will push sales for the final rounds, and hopefully have other things up their sleeve in order to fill Ariake Arena, which is much bigger than their normal Finals venue in Ryogoku (and also further out of the city). The presence of Hirooki Goto and Tetsuya Naito may have offset some of the market to market declines that are reflective not just of the state of the promotion but also on Japan’s current battles with the rising cost of living, an insanely warm summer and some routing choices that have put their talent in a difficult position. The talent on show cannot do much to change the conditions around them, but there are opportunities for them to build for the future by gaining momentum in this one.

Gabe Kidd suffered a hyperextension to his knee during his opening night match with Konosuke Takeshita, forcing him to forfeit the next two matches in his block before pulling out of the tournament completely on Night 5. Kidd was originally thought to need two to four weeks rest after the injury occurred, but all parties waited to see what the path was going forward before the decision to withdraw him from the tournament. Fightful reported that he was not set to make the semi finals of the tournament, so it will not lead to major changes to the planned tournament finish. It is unknown how long he will now be absent from action for.

TV Asahi will screen the last two nights of the G1 Climax live in mid August. The channel will also air documentaries on Hiroshi Tanahashi’s road to retirement and the departure of Tetsuya Naito over the next month.

© STARDOM

Stardom

Sapporo Rendezvous

21/07/2025
Location: Chateraise Gateaux Kingdom Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan
Attendance: 1,056
Watch On: Stardom World
Review by David Hayter

Stardom’s white-hot business streak continues with their first sell-out in Sapporo for a double main event that saw the new leaders of Cosmic Angels, the best friends with diametrically opposed personalities, Natsupoi and Saori Anou, challenge for the World and Wonder of Stardom championships, respectively. Despite the undoubted commercial success of “Sapporo Rendezvous”, the show felt oddly undermined in part by its placement on the calendar. Taking place directly before the start of the Five Star GP and Stardom’s “Nighter in Korakuen”, fans came into the show knowing there was almost zero chance of a major title change. Worse still, because Stardom is set to run Tokyo so intensely the following week, the promotion essentially gave away one of its biggest drawing cards (Natsupoi seeking revenge on Saya Kamitani for forcing Tam Nakano’s retirement) in a building that held a maximum of 1,056 ahead of a series of shows that may struggle to draw (although early returns have been surprisingly strong).

Of course, the fans in Sapporo certainly were not complaining about witnessing two of the biggest title matches Stardom could realistically produce in 2025, and “Rendezvous” proved to be an incredibly easy-to-watch show headlined by two great and stylistically distinct main events. Saori and Starlight Kid’s Wonder of Stardom title match would provide the classic back-and-forth technical action Stardom is famed for, while Saya Kamitani and Natsupoi would forgo a straight wrestling match to indulge in the kind of macro storytelling spectacle that blended elements of their kayfabe rivalry with real-life intensity stemming from Natsupoi’s shoot comments, that visibly shook Kamitani, at the event’s press conference.

Kamitani Bullies Natsupoi To Breaking Point In Wild Crowd-Brawling Main Event

There’s a certain irony in watching Natsupoi, a beloved babyface who is famed for annoying her friends and enemies alike with her pesky high-speed style and high-pitched hyper-enthusiasm, running into a bigger, badder and more relentless troll in the perma-sardonic Phenex Queen, Saya Kamitani. Forget the irresistible force versus the immovable object; this was the lovable annoyance going head-to-head with the very essence of goading, self-satisfied, condescending smugness.

The build-up to this match certainly suggested that Kamitani and Natsupoi had no intention of delivering the acrobatic, high-speed battles that typified their past encounters; instead, the preview tags were defined by a distinct nastiness as Kamitani took pleasure in humiliating her opponent in kayfabe, while Natsupoi followed Sareee’s lead by mocking Kamitani for being a heel in the ring and a kind, likeable, crying babyface in her mainstream television appearances. Both women would land effective final blows. Kamitani would spit directly in Natsupoi’s face at Korakuen Hall before ranting, “You know, you’re always whining and complaining – you’re such a boring woman, an ugly bitch”, while at the “Rendezvous” press conference Natsupoi would accuse Kamitani of squandering Tam Nakano’s legacy:

Unsurprisingly, in this context Saya Kamitani and Natsupoi had little or no interest in trading holds. The match started with a heated lock-up, with Kamitani driving Natsupoi to the corner and clawing at her face, sparking Poi to explode with aggression, unleashing a series of violent hairmares and wild face-washes to her downed opponent. This would lead to a brilliant spot where, in a rage, Poi would go for one final hair-whip, only for Kamitani to gracefully cartwheel through and surprise Natsupoi with a dropkick.

This opening sequence perfectly encapsulated the narrative of the match at large: Kamitani goading Natsupoi into an uncharacteristic fury. The key difference was that while Kamitani was capable of matching Poi’s violence, she always made sure to keep her cool and remain composed in the heat of battle, while Poi’s raw emotion poured out.

The result of this battle between the bully and the bullied was a match that was sloppier, wilder and more free-form than anything you would usually see in a Stardom main event. Rather than exchanging throws, Kamitani and Poi would take turns whipping their opponents into chairs, brawling in the stands, kicking each other down flights of stairs and clawing at each other’s eyes. The story was simple: Saya always knew the right buttons to press. In the early going she would pull out Tam Nakano’s signature kawaii pose to lure Natsupoi into a drop-toe hold and dropkick combination, and later she would cockily strut through the stands and disrespectfully walk over Natsupoi as she played to camera.

© STARDOM

Of course, being a hubristic heel, Saya’s remorseless trolling would give way to overconfidence, allowing Poi to make a series of righteous comebacks: first with dives to the outside and a brilliant Fairy Princess (cross arm-breaker), and later by beating Saya Kamitani’s arse hither and yon across the entire building. A strange equilibrium would soon develop in the match with Kamitani’s overconfidence allowing Natsupoi the opportunity to stage grand comebacks, while Poi’s “gotten-to” hyper-aggression would cause her to make multiple mistakes that would cede control to Kamitani and allow the match to be wrestled in her opponent’s preferred style.

The crowd brawling would ultimately culminate in a strong double count-out tease that would set the stage for a dramatic denouement. After being surprised with a spinning heel kick, Natsupoi would regain control of the match by blasting Saya Kamitani with a series of head kicks and a beautiful Poi-style release German suplex. From here on in, the pair reverted back into a thrilling exchange of their signature offence with Kamitani absolutely levelling Poi with spinning heel and pump kicks respectively. Unfortunately, there was some sloppiness in this intense final showdown, as Poi missed with several of her key kicks and slaps – not so badly as to derail the match, but noticeably enough that they affected the suspension of disbelief.

Thankfully, if Natsupoi’s striking left something to be desired, her selling, comeback timing and bumping couldn’t be questioned, as she delivered a series of heart-breaking near-falls from the Fairy Gift and rolling La Magistral, before turning herself inside out bumping for Saya’s signature bicycle kick. Most importantly of all, if Natsupoi whiffed on several head kicks, she absolutely nailed the most important strike of the entire match where – in a beautiful spot – Saya Kamitani spun for her roundhouse head kick, Poi spun low in the opposite direction and beat Saya to the punch with a beautiful spinning thrust kick to the jaw for an impressive double down. Not to be outdone, Kamitani showcased her own accuracy in a gorgeous moment that saw Poi catch a pump kick, spin Kamitani into a flash release kneeling German suplex only for Kamitani to fully flip at an improbably low angle, land on her feet and hit a bridging back suplex of her own.

The match would ultimately end with Kamitani surviving a series of thrilling desperation near-falls to blast Poi with her Kamigoye-style boot and the spinning Star Crusher to retain her title. Fans of modern Joshi grappling will naturally prefer the second half of this match, which provided a dizzying blend of rapid-fire counter-sequences, stiff striking and wild bumping, to the first half, which was built on macro storytelling, emotional and deeply heated personal (and at times melodramatic) psychology.

There is no doubt that Kamitani and Natsupoi could have a technically better match based purely on spectacular in-ring action in future, but for this stage of their feud and given the story being told with Natsupoi still enraged by Tam Nakano’s retirement and Saya Kamitani’s flippant heel antics, this was the perfect match for the scenario at hand. It was a different approach for Stardom that stands out as a distinct, passion-fueled and character-development-driven main event, providing a great contrast to the classic technical battle that preceded it.

© STARDOM

Starlight Kid and Saori Anou Sacrifice Their Standing Legs For Wonder Of Stardom Title

Saori Anou and Starlight Kid had less animus heading into their Wonder of Stardom clash; in fact, Saori was so nonplussed about the opportunity that she initially turned down the match. Saori considered herself to be unworthy in a year where she had failed to achieve anything, but belatedly accepted the opportunity to set up tonight’s excellent encounter. Playing it cool, Anou kept up her trademark reserve in the early going as she picked the impetuous Kid apart and, after a brutal fisherman’s suplex on the outside, set about targeting her knee. Anou would catch SLK re-entering the ring with a series of rapid-fire dragonscrews before locking in a beautiful Figure 8.

Saori would stalk Kid like a vampiric 18th-century aristocrat, looking down on her opponent as she insouciantly trod down on her knee. No one wrestles quite like Saori, who embodies either an impenetrable reserve or wild desperation with absolutely no shades of grey in between. Fittingly, then, the controlled Saori would nonchalantly saunter across the ring to kick the middle rope to disrupt a Starlight Kid springboard, forcing her opponent to crash, burn and crumple on her knee.

Rather than simply opting to tell an injured underdog versus composed killer targeting a physical weakness story, Kid and Saori flipped the script by giving Saori a taste of her own medicine. Kid would ruthlessly target Saori’s knee in return and would reverse a figure-four to damage Saori. The “anything you can do, I can do better” nature of the psychology didn’t end with the submission battles. In a superb sequence, the pair would exchange fisherman’s suplexes back and forth, leading to a double down. This would be followed with another even exchange with Saori hitting a top rope rana, only for Kid to recover with a wheelbarrow reverse rana off the top rope. Unfortunately, this spot was somewhat blighted by both Kid and Saori hesitating and taking their bumps noticeably late.

© STARDOM

Following an exchange of dragonscrews, the pair would engage in a highly creative striking battle where the two rivals sat opposite each other and took turns kicking one another in the knee. Sadly, this was one of those sequences that was better in theory than execution. The wrestlers could only safely kick the opponent’s knee with great care to avoid accidental injury – and as a result, we were forced to witness light kicks that made no sounds as the wrestlers sold being in great pain. Nevertheless, it was the right choice thematically, even if execution left something to be desired.

The final sequence of the match was genuinely thrilling, with both women’s legs giving out on them, causing them to stumble and fail in their attempts to hit their signature offence, setting up great submission teases for the Black Tiger Leg Killer and the cross arm breaker, respectively. The latter was a bizarre choice from Saori – why she didn’t opt for a heel hook or any move that at least nominally targeted Kid’s leg instead of her arm, I’ll never know. This brief blip could be easily overlooked as Saori hit a series of beautiful bridging suplexes but was unable to properly hold the bridge for the pin due to her weakened knee.

The pair saved the absolute best nearfalls for last, with Anou escaping the Leg Killer to hit a rolling Potato Ring for a convincing nearfall and following up with a sublime bridging suplex where, again, Saori was unable to maintain the bridge due to the injured knee, allowing Kid to kick out at the very last second. From there on in, the writing was on the wall. Kid would hit a moonsault, dragonscrew and lock Saori in the über version of the Black Tiger Leg Killer with the added triangle choke for the submission victory.

This was a superb Wonder of Stardom Championship match and, in being a crisp technical battle, it provided a perfect complement and contrast to the wild hijinks and intensity of the main event. Starlight Kid remains a revelation as a credible main event-level champion; it’s a shame she had to wait so long for this opportunity.

© STARDOM

Hina’s Future Of Stardom Title Reign Goes From Strength-to-Strength

For the past couple of years, it felt like Hina was destined to languish in her sisters’ shadow. While she was concentrating on her studies to graduate from high school and secure a place at college, big sister Hanan was busy winning the Cinderella Tournament and positioning herself as Stardom’s future babyface hero, while her twin Rina was ruling the roost as Future Champion, crafting an image as a cool and conniving heel. Where did this leave Hina? She was missing shows with regularity to stay buried in her books, and it seemed her promising technical wrestling skills would simply atrophy over time.

Well, what a difference a year makes. Hina is now slap bang in the middle of an excellent Future of Stardom title run of her own, where she is carrying incredibly green talent (including the lovably hapless Rian) to wildly entertaining and highly dramatic matches that continue to kick Stardom’s PPV cards off with a bang. Best of all, her look and stage presence are developing, too; she is starting to garner confidence both on the microphone and in the way she carries herself as champion. She already had the best and most lustrous mane of hair in all of wrestling, but now she’s proving herself as a workhorse champion.

Not to be outdone, her opponent Sayaka Kurura has been an instant standout since debuting in Stardom with her flashy springboard arm drags and penetrating spear. However, since those early months, she’s refocused as a storyteller working from underneath, honing her selling and storytelling skills in the mould of a young Tam Nakano by blending sweetness, sorrow and fire. Here, Hina and Kurura combined perfectly, with Sayaka gritting her teeth to endure Hina’s barrage of throws, slams and holds. The transformation both women have undergone was transparent when Hina transitioned into an STF and wrenched on the hold with the screaming determination of a champion, and Sayaka sold with wounded desperation as she reached the ropes (a year ago, both women would have struggled to act this convincingly or consistently).

Make no mistake, they remain a work in progress, and there was a lack of crispness in the work at times as they untidily stumbled into the first spear spot, but they soon got back on track as Hina slammed Kurura down hard for a series of nearfalls. From there, they were off to the races, with Sayaka hitting her brilliant wrap-around sleeper and an incredible penetrating spear for a strong near submission and nearfall respectively. Not to be outdone, Hina countered the sliced bread with a Gedo Clutch to draw a last-second kick out from Kurura and audible gasps from the crowd. The match would peak with Hina hitting her fisherman’s suplex-style Jackhammer that Sayaka barely managed to kick out of at the last second. That would be the end of her resistance, and the new confident, composed and stately Hina would pick up the victory with her third STO of the match, followed by a big frog splash.

© STARDOM

Yuria Hime Upturns Expectations to Qualify for the 5★STAR GP

When the qualifying match between rookies Akira Kurogane and Yuria Hime was announced, most pundits automatically assumed that the more accomplished Kurogane (who has already secured victories over older talent and joined a unit) would be the certain winner. Well, not so fast. Instead, Yuria Hime, who is undoubtedly the greener and more uncertain of the pair, pulled off the shock upset in this heated, if at times sloppy, seven-minute clash.

Yuria, to her credit, has shown great fire in her recent performances and has debuted an eye-catching new look that screams future superstar. Nevertheless, this is a risky choice, as her bumping and selling are nowhere near fully developed, and she still has a habit of telegraphing her opponent’s spots by leaning into them in an unnatural fashion.

Nevertheless, the underdog surprise victory worked a treat here, with Yuria surviving a double-arm suplex and a great crossface to frustrate her opponent before securing victory with a Devil’s Kiss, which she rolled into a brutal-looking trapped-arm bridging headscissors for the decisive submission victory.

© STARDOM

Solid Multiwomen Preview Tags Round Out A Highly Entertaining, If Lightweight, Undercard

With the consequential matches taking place at the start and end of the show respectively, the middle of the card was given over to preview tags for the upcoming “Nighter in Korakuen”.

The pick of the bunch was the victory for Mi Vida Loca over Neo Genesis, which saw Mei Seira and AZM trying to out-bump one another to make Rina Yamashita, Suzu Suzuki and, of course, Bozilla look like absolute monsters. Of course, it wouldn’t take long for the heels to isolate Miyu Amasaki and destroy her, as Bozilla hung her in a tombstone position, allowing Rina and Suzu to hit tandem superkicks before Bozilla hit an odd inverted piledriver-like move to secure victory.

Comedy was the order of the day in the four-way tag team clash between FWC, Bread or Rice, Ami Sohrei & Lady C, and Aya Sakura & Yuna Mizumori. There was plenty of kuma-based hijinks and even a seven-way human centipede headscissors spot that ended with Hanako flipping them all over into one giant Boston crab.

It would get sillier from there, as each wrestler was then Irish whipped face-first into Waka Tsukiyama’s arse (honestly, it’s better if I don’t explain). Thankfully, we did get some impressive wrestling towards the end of the match, as Ami Sohrei captured both Aya and Waka in a single torture rack, while her partner Lady C applied a giant abdominal stretch to both members of FWC. This was swiftly followed by another memorable visual, as the teams hit three stalling vertical suplexes in perfect unison.

The finish was really rather crafty, as Ami whipped Hazuki to the ropes, only for Hazuki to instead hit a suicide dive onto all the other wrestlers on the floor. This left Ami and Koguma alone in the ring, allowing Ami to surprise Koguma and win with the flash cradle while everyone else was laid out on the floor.

The final preview tag was an eight-woman match that pitted STARS & Kikyo Furusawa against H.A.T.E. The match was relatively straightforward and designed to build to the upcoming Wing*Gori vs BMI2000 match at Korakuen Hall.

There wasn’t much of note that took place, with each wrestler taking turns to briefly showcase their signature offence. Tora would overpower Iida, allowing Konami and Ruaka to isolate Hanan, but this proved a mistake as Konami accidentally took out Ruaka with an errant head kick, allowing Hanan to pick up the win with Seventeen.

Full Results

Pre Show Match
Rian defeats Ema Maishima (8:12)

Future Of Stardom Title Match
Hina (c) defeats Sayaka Kurara (13:23)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Qualifying Match
Yuria Hime defeats Akira Kurogane (6:59)

Mi Vida Loca (Bozilla, Rina Yamashita & Suzu Suzuki) defeat Neo Genesis (AZM, Mei Seira & Miyu Amasaki) (8:42)

God’s Eye (Ami Sourei & Lady C) defeat Cosmic Angels (Aya Sakura & Yuna Mizumori) and Empress Nexus Venus (HANAKO & Waka Tsukiyama) and FWC (Hazuki & Koguma) (7:45)

Kikyo Furusawa & STARS (Hanan, Momo Kohgo & Saya Iida) defeat HATE (Konami, Momo Watanabe, Natsuko Tora & Ruaka)

Wonder Of Stardom Title Match
Starlight Kid (c) defeats Saori Anou (21:38)

World Of Stardom Title Match
Saya Kamitani (c) defeats Natsupoi (24:54)

By David Hayter

© STARDOM

Stardom Nighter in Korakuen

7/24/2025
Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan
Attendance: 1,101
Watch on: Youtube for free & Stardom World
Review by Tim Hunter

Korakuen Hall not being close to a sellout is a rather rare sight for Stardom these days, so maybe the attendance of 1,101 should be considered a disappointment for this show, especially since it was a pretty high profile card put together with 3 title matches and the special invasion match of Sareee’s group fighting H.A.T.E. So the reason for the show being down is probably not really card related, but maybe a bit of a saturation setting in, as tournament season starts and there is an insane amount of shows to choose from as a wrestling and a STARDOM fan in the Tokyo area. STARDOM themselves would have 3 big shows during this week alone, with the first one being in Sapporo so no correlation to the ticket sales there, but the opening night for the 5 Star Grand Prix only 3 days later and Jaguar Yokota’s anniversary show with STARDOM involvement 2 days after probably forced a lot of fans to choose between these events since the economic situation in Japan is growing more dire every day.

© STARDOM

If I were to describe the opening bout between Aya Sakura and Kikyo Furasawa in one word, it would be “unfair.” Watching the amount of skill and confidence on display from someone like Kikyo, who is only a few weeks into her career essentially, and Aya Sakura, who is a youngling herself in the veteran role, and comparing that to the talent development in other companies, it just feels unfair. It is crazy how far ahead STARDOM is in that field. This was a very technical match with some exquisite mat work and smooth counters. The strike exchanges showed that Kikyo still has a long way to go in some aspects, but just the confidence of her movements is so far ahead of her curve that it more than makes up for it at this point. Aya and Kikyo worked over each other’s limbs, as Kikyo had control over Aya for a long stretch with excruciating ankle locks, but ultimately Aya managed to trap Kikyo in a triangle armbar to tap her out.

Following the rookie singles match was the typical house show portion that we usually get on these Korakuens with a couple of rather low-stakes, but highly entertaining, multi-man tag matches. The misfit group La Vida Loca beat a conglomeration between EXV and Ema Maishima when Itsuki Aoki pinned Rian after a top rope frogsplash. After this, FWC beat God’s Eye members Lady C and Saki Kashima as well as STARS members Momo Kohgo and Yuria Hime in a three-way tag team match. Perhaps a rather curious theme for these two matches is that non-participants in the 5 Star Grand Prix picked up the wins over people who are in the tournament, as Koguma rolled up Yuria Hime. You’d think that on a show this close to the Grand Prix they would put some emphasis on the participants and try to make them look strong, but alas, it was not the case here. FWC has been a bit on the outs with the promotion in general, so the team picking up the win here could be considered a surprise in several ways.

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Following this was the Mizkan-sponsored match, advertised as Miyu Amasaki and Starlight Kid versus Asuza Inaba and “X”, where X had very obviously the outlines of Fukigen DEATH on the promotional material. In the end, the surprise tag team partner of Azusa ended up being…Fukigen DEATH. Which begs the question…why? Well, anyway. It turns out the match wasn’t quite what we expected, as Starlight Kid, who wore the outfit from her recent advertisement shoot with the vinegar company, was actually introduced as Kantanstarlight Kid, I guess her new gimmick whenever she is fighting for the Mizkan brand. This was just a silly quick sponsorship comedy match, nothing much to worry about. Kantanstarlight Kid picked up the win over Fukigen DEATH with a moonsault press.

Before we got to the business end of the card, we had another eight man tag match when the rest of God’s Eye took on the Cosmic Angels. One thing that I have been noticing is that despite a very strong presentation for her comeback match some weeks ago, Ami Sourei has not seen the greatest success so far since returning from injury. The powerhouse returned from a year long time out and has since been pinned a lot, and here once again she was caught by Saori Annou’s signature bridge pin to take the fall. I’m not sure what exactly the plan is with Ami’s story since she essentially took over the leadership role in God’s Eye after Syuri went to get surgery just to eat all the pins instead of her rookies. Maybe they are telling a story of ring rust after such a long time out, or maybe it is something deeper than that, but I sure hope she can make her way out of this slump. Maybe the 5 Star Grand Prix is gonna be her chance to do so.

In the first of the three title matches of the evening, Mei Seira defended her high speed belt against Honoka from Pro Wrestling WAVE. The match had the special high speed rules that were introduced this year, making it a 2 out of 3 falls match with a 15 minute time limit. This wouldn’t really come into play at all since Mei just pinned Honoka twice in just over 5 minutes, but I thought these 5 minutes were a ton of fun with some incredible athleticism and high speed sequences on display. The few times I have seen Honoka in STARDOM, I thought she has always been very impressive and maybe I was hoping she would get a little bit more here. But if you have always wondered what the high speed style was really about, these 5 minutes epitomized it.

© STARDOM

Sareee’s invasion of STARDOM, bringing her two young protegés Chi Chi and Miku Kanae along, was up next and one thing was clear from the start: they were not welcome here. The team they went up against consisted of both H.A.T.E. members in Sareee’s 5 Star Grand Prix block, Konami and Momo Watanabe, as well as the endboss Saya Kamitani herself. The match was built on the “Sareee ISM VIII” show when The Sun God and her tag partner Takumi Iroha defeated Saya Kamitani and Natsuko Tora on their home turf. After the match, 4 members of H.A.T.E. ambushed Sareee before Miku and Chi Chi hurried to her aid. Sareee then grabbed a microphone to announce her little invasion at Korakuen Hall. The atmosphere for this was very unique, as H.A.T.E., historically the only pure heel faction in STARDOM, managed to greatly endear themselves to the Korakuen audience by the sheer presence of the outsiders. I will go deeper into the topic of how H.A.T.E. and Sareee managed to accomplish this very unusual crowd response for this storyline in my review for the Sareee vs Konami match, which followed 3 days later on the 5 Star Grand Prix opening night. It is a fantastic piece of work. In this match, H.A.T.E. managed to mostly keep Sareee at bay while Konami systematically dismantled Miku Kanae and destroyed her arm, pulling her up at the count of 2 at one point just so she could continue her destruction. After Miku finally tapped, H.A.T.E. continued to beat the tar out of the invaders to an incredibly shocked reaction by Sareee. Maybe she had underestimated the promotion she accused of being “too fake” before. Maybe she’s in over her head against this behemoth of a faction. Or maybe she’s put herself into the exact position she wants to be in.

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After the intermission, we had the clear and far away match of the night, maybe match of the week even, as AZM defended her NJPW Strong Women’s championship against the German monster Bozilla. This wasn’t just your typical David vs Goliath match; this had something special and it may have been the best match in Bozilla’s career. She is probably about three times the size of AZM when it comes to mass and yet her selling in this match was incredibly believable and effective. Of course, she was no-selling and dominating AZM at first, throwing her into the rows of chairs on the outside and manhandling (womanhandling?) her with an impressive stalling suplex. While you will usually see the David in this equation work over the giant’s legs to bring them down to their size, AZM took a different approach, going right for the head and arms. She would springboard herself off the bottom rope in order to deliver a devastating kick to the dome on the apron that left Bozilla looking dizzy for the first time in the match, before AZM managed to tear her down with an incredible La Mistica from the apron to the floor. This was not enough to fell the giant yet as Bozilla quickly recuperated with a sick apron powerbomb. After they both beat the 20 count to get inside of the ring, the war of attrition began.

They were on their knees throwing bombs, they were on the ropes throwing bombs – and once again, AZM was not going for the legs. She focused on Bozilla’s arms instead whenever she would have the chance to get a hold of them from the top rope, or when Bozilla was flat on the mat. Bozilla at this point was screaming in pain from her damaged arms as she needed multiple powerbombs to shake the high speed wrestler from the grip of her triangle armbar. This was not yet enough, as Bozilla managed to kick out of another La Mistica Azumi Sushi combination. The real beginning of the end for the giant came when she missed a moonsault and splatted on the mat. After this, AZM managed to turn a powerbomb into a devastating poisonrana, hit an incredible destroyer, a second rope Code Red and ultimately put Bozilla away with a double armtrap pin. This match was insane, the best performance I’ve ever seen from Bozilla and if she continues like this, I think STARDOM can get a ton out of her. After the match Bozilla feigned humility when she said “AZM Senpai, this match is all I asked for, thank you,” before luring AZM into a handshake only to deliver the F5 in a smart way to keep her heat with the audience.

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The main event of the show saw the Goddesses of Stardom titles on the line as Wing*Gori were looking for their 6th defense of the titles in their 207 day reign against BMI 2000 (Natsuko Tora and Ruaka from H.A.T.E.). This match couldn’t quite keep up with the semi main event, but very few matches could. The big story of this match was probably Ruaka who has had very few moments to shine in her STARDOM career so far, but this match was clearly designed as an opportunity to do so. As is customary for H.A.T.E. matches, it started off with a long heat period on the outside before a control period in the ring where the heels kept beating down Hanan. After she managed to tag in Saya Iida, there was a fun back and forth between Iida and Tora, culminating in an impressive powerbomb from Iida to the much bigger Tora. The faces then had the upper hand for quite a while. A first attempt at a double top rope splash from the heels was evaded, before Ruaka managed to hit Hanan with the mist which spelled the beginning of the end for the babyface team. The second dual splash then found their target, and after a German suplex Ruaka hit Hanan with an impressive stalling straight jacket German, the debut for this move from Ruaka, for the win. This is the heel team’s second tag team title win and one would think that this signifies a start for Hanan’s push as a singles wrestler this close to the 5 Star Grand Prix. After the match, Tora ambushed the babyface team with the tag team title trophy.

This was another very noteworthy show at Korakuen Hall for the promotion and despite not selling out, it clearly sent the message that these events keep being “can’t miss” affairs.

Full Results

Pre-Show Match
Aya Sakura defeats Kikyo Furusawa (8:41)

Mi Vida Loca (Akira Kurogane, Itsuki Aoki, Rina Yamashita & Suzu Suzuki) defeat Ema Maishima & Empress Nexus Venus (HANAKO, Rian & Waka Tsukiyama) (12:59)

FWC (Hazuki & Koguma) defeat God’s Eye (Lady C & Saki Kashima) und Momo Kohgo & Yuria Hime (6:58)

Neo Genesis (Miyu Amasaki & Starlight Kid) defeat HATE (Azusa Inaba & Fukigen Death) (7:55)

Cosmic Angels (Natsupoi, Saori Anou, Sayaka Kurara & Yuna Mizumori) defeat God’s Eye (Ami Sourei, Hina, Ranna Yagami & Tomoka Inaba) (10:21)

High Speed Title Best Two Out Of Three Falls:
Mei Seira (c) defeats Honoka [2:0] (5:16)
– Mei Seira pins Honoka [1:0] (1:28)
– Mei Seira pins Honoka [2:0]

HATE (Konami, Momo Watanabe & Saya Kamitani) defeat Chi Chi, Miku Kanae & Sareee (9:28)

NJPW STRONG Women’s Title:
AZM (c) defeats Bozilla (15:20)

Goddesses Of Stardom Title:
H.A.T.E. (Natsuko Tora & Ruaka) defeat STARS (Hanan & Saya Iida) (c) (17:53)

By Tim Hunter

© STARDOM

5 Star Grand Prix Opening Night

27.07.2025
Ota City General Gymnasium, Tokyo, Japan
Attendance: 1.783
Watch On: Stardom World at some point in the future
Review by Tim Hunter

This show was something special. It did something to me. It triggered something in my mind. Like an eureka moment. It’s hard to grasp what exactly caused it, or what exactly “it” even is, but it was like something renewed a spark for the love of pro wrestling inside of me.

The funny thing about it is that I was not particularly into it at all after the first half dozen matches or so. This is also where the first “special” factor for this card comes into play. It consisted of 16 matches. In our last issue, I wrote in my preview for the tournament how bloated this tournament was, with 32 participants inhabiting 4 different groups. Stardom decided to put every single one of them on the opening card – which is understandable, I guess. But this also constituted a certain rushed feeling for some of the matches if the show wasn’t to become an eight hour behemoth. So the first hour of the show went just blow after blow. The vast difference in hierarchy levels, that I also discussed in my preview, created several rather uneven matchups that were all dealt with precipitously and unceremoniously with a quick brawl, a hope segment for the underdog and the favourite hitting their finish for the win. Bing bang boom, in and out, in anywhere from 30 seconds to seven minutes.

This would be the modus operandi for Saya Kamitani over Lady C (7:25), Ami Sourei over Aya Sakura (4:01), Miyu Amasaki over Yuria Hime (2:42), Rina over Rian (6:35), Momo Watanabe over Momo Kongo (2:51), Mei Seira over Waka Tsukiyama (0:28), Suzu Suzuki over Hina (6:14), HANAKO over Ranna Yagami (6:55) and Bea Priestley over Yuna Mizumori (7:27).

© STARDOM

Up until this point, this was pretty much a monotonous slop. Very easily digestible, at times quite fun and fast paced, but formulaic and predictable slop. There were some highlights. Mei Seira putting away Waka after a quick flurry of high speed moves in under 30 second was a fun surprise, the dyslexian’s nightmare matchup, Rian vs Rina, was everything it promised to be – with Rian’s rapidly improving in-ring form and Rina as the confident bully – and Saya Kamitani’s selling for Lady C was just great; she gave the giant a lot of hope spots and nearfalls before beating her in the end. Bea Priestley looked like she was mostly able to retain her in-ring form at the same level during her multiple year long hiatus from professional wrestling, but it looks like she’s since been overtaken by up & coming workers like her opponent Yuna Mizumori, who looked like the better worker at this point.

So as you can tell, after roughly the first half of the opening night, I was not overly impressed. In fact, I found myself feeling increasingly validated for the qualms I had with the tournament format. Too many wrestlers watering down the match quality and lowering the prestige of the Grand Prix. Little did I know what was awaiting me on the last two hours of this show.

© STARDOM

The first big surprise of the evening happened in the Azusa Inaba vs Hanan match. I have seen Hanan being hailed by many as one of the heavy hitters of the tournament, and rightfully so. She is now a faction leader, having taken over from the Icon Mayu Iwatani to lead long lasting babyface institution STARS, of all things. She has forever been portrayed as one of STARDOM’s big prodigies with a great future ahead of her. She just shed the tag team titles after a long and very impressive run with tag team partner Saya Iida, surely so she can focus on her career as a singles wrestler. AND she has brand new gear! How could she possibly be stopped in this tournament? Well as we would find out, all it takes is a 17 year old brat from H.A.T.E. called Azusa Inaba and just a tiny bit of interference as her sister Rina tripped her up from the outside when she was running the ropes, which led to a really neat looking flash pin by Inaba. And it was over! One of the tournament favourites already off to a bad start.

Next up was the “hoss battle” between Bozilla and Ruaka. I guess theoretically you could call it a hoss battle as Ruaka is on the bigger side compared to the rest of the STARDOM roster; however, Bozilla still towers over Ruaka in a massive way. So being turned into an undersized underdog, Ruaka, who just won the tag team titles with her partner Natsuko Tora 3 nights earlier, reached deep into her pockets and found Toru Yano’s G1 playbook. She tried everything, luring Bozilla to the other end of the arena to then hightail it back to the ring, but Bozilla made it back in time. After receiving a beatdown in the ring, Ruaka went back to the outside where she was just running in circles from the German monster and up the ramp where she taped Bozilla’s hands to the railing. Bozilla freed herself with no effort whatsoever, but at this point she was so irritated and annoyed that she apparently saw red as she completely ignored the ref’s count while she tried to inflict more punishment onto Ruaka which ultimately led to a double countout. Another big upset!

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Saori Anou vs Saya Iida just ruled. It was brutal. Saya Iida chopped Saori into oblivion. She chopped her in the corner, she chopped her in the air, she chopped her on the ground. At some point it almost looked like Saori started enjoying the chops? You can never tell with this maniac. A maniac she was, not only for receiving a thousand chops, but she was also on a mission to find the sickest neckbump possible in this match, culminating in a full 180° rotation to land straight on the top of her head for one of Iida’s lariats. It was pure insanity. After she was apparently sufficiently satisfied with this bump, Saori decided to turn it up and start fighting back. She quickly regained the upper hand over the much shorter powerhouse and after some excellent grappling managed to tap her out with an armbar. An extremely fun match and Saori continues a sneakily great in-ring year.

Natsuko Tora and AZM followed this up with a really nice sprint. While the first half of the show may have been a rather monotonous mush, the back end was extraordinarily paced with completely diverse match types. AZM is so good right now. After her blow away match with Bozilla 3 days earlier, she had to deal with another monster and she took a bit of a different approach, sneak attacking Tora before the bell and taking it to the outside. The problem is that this is typically the H.A.T.E. member’s domain, so Tora quickly got the upper hand and once back inside the ring AZM additionally crashed into the cold hard steel of the turnbuckles, which were exposed by Natsuko in one excellently timed swift movement. This should already spell the beginning of the end for AZM, who couldn’t fell two giants in a row, as Tora countered the Azumi Sushi following La Mistica into a roll up of her own.

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Following a brief intermission after only, uh, the FOURTEENTH match, it was time for Starlight Kid vs Tomoka Inaba. Starlight Kid, coming off of a fantastic leg work match against Saori Anou at the “Sapporo Rendezvous”, told herself what worked before will work again as both competitors instantly went for each others’ legs once more. And they played this brilliantly. The work in this match was masterful and the selling magnificent. It was at some point during this match that I had this epiphany I described in the introduction to this review. Just a moment of euphoria over the brilliance transpiring on my screen. I haven’t felt this way in quite a while. I guess it goes back to 4/27 when Tam Nakano lost the career vs title match at “All Star Grand Queendom” that some of my passion for the sport just…went away with her. Whether it was this incredible finishing stretch from Inaba and Kid specifically, this entire show, or the remarkable 1-2-3 punch of “Sapporo Rendezvous”, “Nighter in Korakuen” and now this opening night in Ota Ward that STARDOM produced in the span of a week, it felt so invigorating. It felt like my love for pro wrestling had new lifeblood. I believe a part of my wrestling fandom will forever be gone, but this finally felt like the kickoff I needed to rebuild my passion. One thought just wouldn’t leave me alone for the rest of this show: this is just the best thing. And I don’t mean pro wrestling as a whole, I mean this thing specifically. I truly believe that STARDOM right now produces the best professional wrestling in the world.

Tomoka Inaba would continue to punish Starlight Kid’s leg with devastating kicks and brutal holds until Kid was essentially unable to do anything anymore. She couldn’t use her speed and she couldn’t lock in her signature numero dos hold either without quickly crumbling to the pain of her own legs. The pain and struggle on display in this match was special. Just heart wrenching selling from Kid and clean and calculated offense by Inaba, and in another upset the Wonder of STARDOM champion had to tap to a brutal looking figure four variation from Tomoka, which will surely set up a white belt match for the future, as the winner did not hesitate to point at Kid’s belt after the match.

Next up was finally Sareee’s long awaited 5 Star Grand Prix debut. What an incredible debut it was from start to finish. Sareee has been doing such brilliant heel work ever since her initial interactions with Syuri this year in the press, on social media, as well as on her own produce shows and on the STARDOM shows she appeared on, that she has managed to turn the H.A.T.E. unit – notoriously THE heel unit in Stardom dating back years and years ago to their time as Oedo Tai – into faces to these fans. It is even more surprising since her opponent in this match, Konami, had her heel turn by betraying the aforementioned Syuri last year. So basically both competitors built their heel heat on the same opponent, but Sareee did such an incredible job at upsetting STARDOM’s entire fanbase with her statements that Konami was inadvertently turned into the saviour of pro wrestling in their eyes. Both workers sniffed out the atmosphere in the arena instantly and leaned into it heavily. Loud chants of KO-NA-MI were only interspersed by a deafening chorus of boos whenever Sareee was on offense and stomped a mudhole into her opponent and refused to acknowledge any sort of rope breaks or rules.

© STARDOM

So. How did we get here? How did a single person who is not even in the promotion manage to flip the entire heel face dynamic on its head? How did this wrestler who had a ridiculously terrible and possibly damaging run in the WWE become one of the most polarizing figures in Japanese wrestling merely 2 years later? Well, it is quite curious. The attack points that Sareee uses are not all too different from the things the greatest babyface in the history of the promotion Tam Nakano said on her crusade against the promotion’s heel group and their leader Saya Kamitani during the first half of the year until she was ultimately defeated and vanquished by the Phenex Queen.

Tam had always held onto the belief that Saya’s turn to the dark side was nothing but a façade, the heavy make up to hide her insecurities and the heel tactics in the ring shameful and a blemish to the organization. She wanted to bring wrestling back to the top of the promotion, not the charade that Kamitani and her group of cheating lackeys brought to display. This core belief, the belief in the return of proper pro wrestling not just to STARDOM, but to joshi as a whole, has been Sareee’s mission statement ever since returning from her horror trip into the world of sports entertainment. It’s what she has founded her own institution Sareee ISM on and it’s what her quest for the IWGP Women’s Title was about, which she ultimately won from Syuri last month at “The Conversion”.

So the question still remains, why does that make her this hated figure? How does this get her booed out of the building against a cheating ne’er-do-well who usually wins her matches by blinding her opponents with black spraypaint? She wants to bring honest pro wrestling back, she doesn’t like the cheating heels making the sport look bad, how is that anything but a valiant babyface effort?

© Sareee

Well it’s all in the tone, her presentation and her position as an outsider. Where Tam’s fight against H.A.T.E. was one of incredible passion, one of love for STARDOM and one of fear over losing her protegé Sayaka Kurara to the dark side, Sareee’s fight is one of incredible arrogance, one of disdain for STARDOM and one of desire to bring back Inokiism. Sareee’s wrestling character since returning to Japan has been deeply entrenched in hypocrisy and lies. She mocked Syuri for getting emotional over the IWGP belt and quickly turned around to out herself as the biggest mark for the letters IWGP by praying to Inoki’s statue. She made fun of Syuri for partaking in a stage play, and therefore missing a few wrestling dates in the process after she had just taken an entire month off from wrestling, just to prepare for her first match with Syuri herself. She expressed her wish to participate in the 5 Star Grand Prix to make it the most intense league ever and then immediately began to complain about the lack of competition in the tournament. She held press conferences for Sareee ISM where she stated that a reason for the promotion’s existence was to fight against unserious idol wrestling presentation. She then turned around to make “Barbie Girl” Chi Chi and Actwres girl Miku Kanae into her major rookie projects of the shows and continuously book STARDOM’s idol stable Cosmic Angels, who are among her best friends, by the way. Then she invited the Crush Gals to pass the torch to her and her partner Takumi Iroha.

I think the last part specifically is an important piece to the puzzle of deciphering Sareee and where her heel character misaligns with her true sensibilities. The timing also plays an important factor. It’s no accident that she started ramping up these ridiculous and arrogant statements in the press and on social media around the time she first crossed paths with Syuri. The plan to take the IWGP championship to accompany her Inokiist character before going after Saya Kamitani and her rag tag group of mischievous individuals who obviously represent anything but Inoki and enter the 5 Star Grand Prix must have been set quite a while ago and she has been working on her character ever since.

So, does a hypocritical character make for a worse pro wrestler? Of course not. It makes Sareee a terrific heel. It makes her a wrestler who will be able to turn an entire fanbase against her while fighting a ne’er-do-well who usually uses black spray paint to blind her opponents.

Sareee portrays an incredible shithead. She plays herself as a phony and a liar, but the ethos she created around her persona is consistent. She is one of the best pro wrestlers in the world and she understands how to play the audience down to the deepest smart fans on an incredible meta level – and obviously it works like a charm. She has been recognised as one of the best in ring workers in the world throughout the past two years. It is time to also acknowledge her incredible character work.

Data by Velkej Braha

Fortunately for her, something else happened in the promotion at the same time to compound her desired effect: Saya Kamitani became incredibly popular. Not just in STARDOM, but in the general media. She made regular appearances on mainstream TV until she was actually offered a recurring spot on a Japanese morning show for the next 3 months. Ticket sales in the promotion year over year with her at the top soared sky high. Korakuen shows sell out if she’s simply in an 8 man tag match in the main event. Through the work of Tam Nakano, Saya Kamitani became a legitimate Superstar. Inadvertently this also had an effect on her entire stable H.A.T.E. It felt like people were just naturally warming up to the heels through the power of Kamitani’s popularity. The dastardly villains became loveable scoundrels. With the stable’s workers Konami and Momo Watanabe landing in Sareee’s Grand Prix block and the public spat that ensued, they inadvertently became the saviours of the promotion from the evil invader.

© STARDOM

After this brief excursion into the weird psychology of this match, all that is left for me to tell you is that it was incredible. The atmosphere in the building was one that you will very rarely get in STARDOM. The sustained heat felt like it was on the verge of becoming something revolutionary, and when Sareee in the end went unconscious in Konami’s rear naked choke and lost clean it was ready to explode. This was probably Konami’s first clean win in over a year and it may have just made this Sareee vs H.A.T.E. war into the biggest story of the tournament.

© STARDOM

The main event of Natsupoi against Sayaka Kurara unfortunately couldn’t quite follow the spectacle it followed in the ring, but I think there were many good reasons for it to be the main event nonetheless. As I hinted at before in this article, the promotion is still firmly walking the Tam Road and that is no surprise and no mistake as it’s the most successful thing the promotion has ever created. So Tam’s protegé going against Tam’s second half and tag team partner is a very special match up for the overarching story of the entire company. As stablemates it will be a rarity. Natsupoi, coming fresh off a loss against the big bad Saya Kamitani in the main event of the “Sapporo Rendezvous”, made it clear that this will not be the end of the story. Her winning the tournament would be a great first step for her redemption and in the process she has to be firmly established as a main eventer. I think the prediction that it will ultimately be Natsupoi to dethrone Saya in a distant future and avenge Tam is not an outlandish one. Also the symbolism of Saya Kamitani opening the show and Natsupoi closing it should not get lost here. It is something that will be repeated on the second show of the tournament as well, so it’s clearly no accident.

The match itself showed a great underdog performance by Kurara once again, whose increased incorporation of Tam Nakano’s moveset into her arsenal by adding the crossbody to the outside, the corner choke and the violet shooting is heartwarming to see. In the end, unlike the preceding matches, this would not be the time for another upset victory, however, as Natsupoi managed to put Sayaka away with the Fairy-ing Ring after giving Kurara a lot of the match and letting her kick out of the Fairial Gift once.

If you have read my preview of this tournament, you know that I was a big sceptic of it going in and quite disappointed after the initial announcement, but if it continues to blow away in this fashion, I will be the first to admit that I was wrong and be glad to do so.

Full Results

Pre-Show
Akira Kurogane & FWC (Hazuki & Koguma) defeat Ema Maishima, Kikyo Furusawa & Saki Kashima (12:28)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Red Stars A
Saya Kamitani [2] defeats Lady C [0] (7:25)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Blue Stars B
Ami Sourei [2] defeats Aya Sakura [0] (4:01)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Blue Stars B
Miyu Amasaki [2] defeats Yuria Hime [0] (2:42)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Red Stars B
Rina [2] besiegt Rian [0] (6:35)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Blue Stars B
Momo Watanabe [2] defeats Momo Kohgo [0] (2:51)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Red Stars A
Mei Seira [2] defeats Waka Tsukiyama [0] (0:28)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Blue Stars B
Suzu Suzuki [2] defeats Hina [0] (6:14)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Blue Stars B
HANAKO [2] defeats Ranna Yagami [0] (6:55)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Red Stars A
Bea Priestley [2] besiegt Yuna Mizumori [0] (7:27)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Red Stars A
Azusa Inaba [2] defeats Hanan [0] (5:37)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Blue Stars B
Bozilla [1] vs. Ruaka [1] – Double Count Out (8:42)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Blue Stars B
Saori Anou [2] defeats Saya Iida [0] (10:50)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Red Stars B
Natsuko Tora [2] defeats AZM [0] (4:18)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Red Stars B
Tomoka Inaba [2] defeats Starlight Kid [0] (14:13)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Blue Stars B
Konami [2] defeats Sareee [0] (13:24)

5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Red Stars B
Natsupoi [2] defeats Sayaka Kurara [0] (11:56)

By Tim Hunter

Stardom 5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Day 2

July 30th 2025, Morioka Gymnasium, Morioka, Iwate, Japan
Live Attendance: 448 (No comparable show from last year)
Watch On: Stardom World
Review by Chris Whitehead

There may be no bigger vibe shift in all of wrestling than the pivot from opening show of Stardom’s annual round robin tournament to the second show. The first show is always a PPV show with a big production, a lengthy card and is usually a “best foot forward” event held somewhere in the Tokyo area, most typically at Ota Ward gymnasium. The second show, meanwhile, is typically in a small municipal gym out in a less urban province, with far fewer production values, one quarter as many people and maybe some basketball backboards spotted in the background.

The 2025 5StarGP kept this delightful tradition alive, as we entered second round action in the Red Stars block in the (clearly not air conditioned) gym in Morioka, where every living human is seemingly equipped with a hand fan and a drink of water. (I suspect I would have passed out before the intermission had I been there.) As a result of the relatively inhospitable conditions, the crowd was somewhat lower on energy than might otherwise be expected but this did not deter the wrestlers, who all gave performances to the standard of the 5StarGP despite the heat and tired crowd.

In a repeat of the Opening Night, and possibly an omen, the show opened with Saya Kamitani’s match and closed with Natsupoi’s, coming off their excellent Red Belt match in Sapporo a few weeks earlier. (It may not be an omen and may just be as simple as the first couple matches being simulcast that it makes sense to have a star open the show, but in the early rounds of a tournament we are on the hunt for a narrative.) Saya made light work of Yuna Mizumori to move to 4 points from her 2 matches, but Natsupoi failed to overcome Natsuko Tora, a repeat of the outcome of their only other singles match in the 2023 5StarGP. Could this early stumble for the presumed favorite in the packed Red Stars B block lead to an upsetting of the betting odds? Time will tell. Natsupoi’s loss was somewhat of her own making, as she boldly/foolishly attempted to outpower her much larger opponent, including one attempt at a release German suplex which ended with Poi essentially dropping Tora on top of herself and literally fighting from underneath thereafter.

Elsewhere, Rina continued her momentum from Night 1, defeating Sayaka Kurara to move to 2-0, while her older sister Hanan got her first points on the board by defeating Waka Tsukiyama in less than 90 seconds, as we appear to be looking at a “how fast can people beat Waka” sub plot. Starlight Kid also got her first points on the board, recovering from her upset loss to Tomoka Inaba on night 1 to defeat Rian, while her unit-mate Mei Seira beat Lady C to remain undefeated. Kid’s unit-mate/forever rival AZM defeated Tomoka to score her first points, and in her post match comments used “MMA Math” to note that she beat Tomoka, who beat Kid, hence AZM is ahead of Kid despite them both having two points at this stage.

Overall, the second day of 5Star action was an easy to watch show that breezed by, with at least one match that was “good or better” and nothing truly underwhelming.

Full Results

Red Stars A Block:
Saya Kamitani [4] defeats Yuna Mizumori [0] (8:42)

Red Stars A Block:
Mei Seira [4] defeats Lady C [0] (7:17)

Red Stars B Block:
Starlight Kid [2] defeats Rian [0] (9:20)

Red Stars A Block:
Bea Priestley [4] defeats Azusa Inaba [2] (10:26)

Red Stars B Block:
AZM [2] defeats Tomoka Inaba [2] (12:32)

Red Stars A Block:
Hanan [2] defeats Waka Tsukiyama [0] (1:12)

Red Stars B Block:
Rina [4] defeats Sayaka Kurara [0] (11:06)

Red Stars B Block:
Natsuko Tora [4] defeats Natsupoi [2] (10:05)

Stardom 5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Day 3

August 1st 2025, Big Palette Fukushima, Koriyama, Fukushima, Japan
Live Attendance: 384 (No comparable show from last year)
Watch On: Stardom World
Review by Chris Whitehead

The “Big Palette” in Koriyama offered something unique, that I don’t recall ever seeing before: the Stardom team bus/coach (in which the wrestlers travel between shows) was parked inside the building, behind the curtain on the hard cam side. I have no idea if that was just a convenient parking spot or if it was doubling as the change room but it stood out immediately when I started watching the show. On the plus side, this venue appeared to be air conditioned and the crowd did not appear to be melting, thanks to the wonders of Freon.

Day 3 saw second round action in the Blue Stars block and gave us our first opportunity to see and hear* the reaction to Sareee outside Tokyo, where the invading heel was showered with boos on opening night (boos she worked hard to elicit, by the way). Here in Koriyama, unlike in Tokyo, she received a generous response from the crowd, many of whom were likely thrilled to see the 2024 Tokyo Sports Women’s MVP and contender for best wrestler alive take on Ranna Yagami. That said, Sareee continued her work to make every Stardom crowd boo her, pulling Ranna’s hair and biting her arm on her way to defeating Ranna and getting her first points on the board. As the self styled savior of joshi puroresu, who claims to be the link to the Showa-era of joshi greatness, Sareee wants to sit alone atop the mountain of greatness, with Chigusa Nagayo’s and Lioness Asuka’s blessings and with Antonio Inoki’s ghost by her side. She will not rest until the world bends to her perspective and her war with Stardom, its fans and its wrestlers looks to be one of the most interesting sub plots in this year’s tournament. (Note: I added the * above as we aren’t always able to hear the initial reaction to Sareee on these shows during her entrance, due to licensing issues with her theme her entrances are muted on these shows)

Elsewhere, Bozilla notched her first win by making short work of rookie Yuria Hime in what my notes say was “a cool murder”, the H.A.T.E. on H.A.T.E. match between Momo Watanabe and Konami underwhelmed my expectations, but Momo won to stay undefeated and Suzu Suzuki made quick work of Momo Kohgo to also remain undefeated. The scheduled Aya Sakura vs Ruaka match was postponed to a later show.

In a more lighthearted moment, Miyu Amasaki and Saori Anou renewed their “Battle of Kansai Pride” that was first explored in last year’s GP, with Miyu attempting to lead the crowd in a chant for her hometown of Kyoto, before attempting to convince Saori to in turn lead a chant for her home Shiga, which, in her ice-queen fashion, Saori would not do. Miyu’s extended attempts at stirring feelings of hometown pride included asking referee Daichi to pick a side (he noted himself as being from Tokyo and declined to partake) and eventually led to Miyu achieving one of the rarest feats in wrestling, as Saori broke character by laughing at this silliness, at which point the crowd chanted for Shiga on her behalf. This is where I should note that this “Battle of Kansai Pride” made MUCH more sense last year in Kyoto when Miyu had her hometown solidly on her side, rather than being 400+ miles away in Fukushima. After these hijinks were over, Saori beat Miyu in an enjoyable match to remain undefeated.

The main event saw Ami Sourei defeat Saya Iida in a good match, during which I felt like I saw Ami’s post-injury confidence increase in real time as Saya bumped like a maniac for her and truly made Ami look like a killer. This result left Saya with no points on the board while keeping Ami undefeated.

Full Results

Blue Stars A Block:
Bozilla [3] defeats Yuria Hime [0] (4:15)

Blue Stars B Block:
Suzu Suzuki [4] defeats Momo Kohgo [0] (6:51)

Blue Stars B Block:
Sareee [2] defeats Ranna Yagami [0] (10:36)

Blue Stars A Block:
Saori Anou [4] defeats Miyu Amasaki [2] (10:03)

Blue Stars B Block:
Momo Watanabe [4] defeats Konami [2] (10:28)

Blue Stars Block:
Ami Sourei [4] defeats Saya Iida [0] (12:00)

Stardom 5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Day 4

August 2nd 2025, Sendai PIT, Sendai, Miyagi, Japan
Live Attendance: 470 (+35% increase from the equivalent 2024 GP Show)
Watch On: Stardom World
Review by Chris Whitehead

Stardom returned to one of its regular haunts, the Sendai PIT, for Round 3 of Red Stars action and with one of the company’s signature matches (SLK vs AZM) in the main event slot, drew a massively increased house compared to last years 5StarGP show (day 8 headlined by Maika vs Hazuki). In typical PIT style, the room was dark and the confines were cozy, but in a change from the deep days of the pandemic the crowd is no longer deathly quiet (no longer is this the Pit of Despair) and the fans were rewarded with the best show of the tour so far.

In the semi-main event, a H.A.T.E. vs H.A.T.E. match saw Rina defeat unit leader Natsuko Tora to remain undefeated on 6 points, after Tora succumbed to hubris and pulled Rina up mid-pinfall from a certain victory, to inflict a little extra damage to her junior, only for Rina to flash pin Tora, and lay another brick in the wall that perhaps one day leads to Rina retiring Tora and taking over the unit (pure speculation on my part.) The other H.A.T.E. vs H.A.T.E. match on this show saw the #2 member, Saya Kamitani (realistically #1 but we don’t need to get into it), defeat the other junior member Azusa Inaba in an enjoyable match in which Saya, unlike Tora, did not take her junior lightly.

Elsewhere, Hanan and Mei Seira in their second ever singles match went to their second time limit draw, as each appears to have the other’s number but not enough to get a victory over the line; Lady C put her first points on the board by defeating Yuna Mizamori (sidebar: the “nameless benefactors”/friends with whom I watched this show would like me to share their idea that we get Lady C a heavily muscled, but short man to act as her valet – perhaps John Silver is available?); Bea Priestly stayed undefeated by beating Waka Tsukiyama, but Bea was unwilling or unable to continue the “how fast can Waka lose” story by wasting time heeling on the outside early in the match. I am admittedly the low man on Bea but her return to the company hasn’t done much for me yet, as while she at best has plateaued/at worst regressed during her time in various warehouses the last five years, the working standard in Stardom has increased noticeably and she now seems a further step behind where she was in 2019.

The two matches worth checking out on this show are Natsupoi vs Tomoka Inaba and (of course) Starlight Kid vs AZM. Poi and Inaba had – to this point – the best match in the tournament, trading some excellent kicks, and working a high pace throughout, with Poi (of course) selling excellently throughout and continuing the work SLK started on opening night of making Inaba look like a real threat. AZM and SLK went to a time limit draw, bringing their career records to 5-4-4 in SLK’s favor, as AZM was unable to get back to parity following her loss to SLK in their white belt match in April. Much like that match, this was another version of their new, “mature” approach to their rivalry matches, with less of the flash of the classic high speed matches and more of the mat work and mental game of their current incarnations. The TLD also prevented the need to book another white belt match if AZM had won, or to put Kid too far ahead in their record. It also put them both squarely in the middle of Red Stars Block B with 3 points, one win, one loss and one draw apiece.

Full Results

Red Stars Block B:
Sayaka Kurara [2] defeats Rian [0] (8:05)

Red Stars Block A:
Bea Priestley [6] defeats Waka Tsukiyama [0] (4:53)

Red Stars Block B:
Natsupoi [4] defeats Tomoka Inaba [2] (9:12)

Red Stars Block A:
Saya Kamitani [6] defeats Azusa Inaba [2] (8:01)

Red Stars Block A:
Lady C [2] defeats Yuna Mizumori [0] (6:56)

Red Stars Block A:
Hanan [3] vs. Mei Seira [5] – Time Limit Draw (15:00)

Red Stars Block B:
Rina [6] defeats Natsuko Tora [4] (9:58)

Red Stars Block B:
AZM [3] vs. Starlight Kid [3] – Time Limit Draw (15:00)

Stardom 5STAR Grand Prix 2025 Day 5 (Afternoon & Evening Shows)

August 3rd 2025, Utsunomiya Light Cube, Utsunomiya, Tochigi, Japan
Afternoon Show Attendance: 542 (+6% increase from equivalent 2024 GP Show)
Evening Show Attendance: 502 (+18% increase from equivalent 2024 GP Show)
Watch On: Stardom World
Review by Chris Whitehead

With the continuing and growing success of Stardom’s “Three Sisters” (Hanan, Hina and Rina), Utsunomiya has become a regular stop, given its proximity to the sisters’ hometown of Shimotsuke, and a stop in which they all receive a warm reception, even heel Rina. The two shows were built around the sisters, with Hina taking the main event in the afternoon show, and with the evening show seeing Rina in the semi-main and Hanan in the main event.

Hina had the best showing of the three, by nature of her being paired with Sareee, who was able to further extend her heel persona by facing the hometown hero and was showered with boos. Those boos are the product of months of promos, press interviews and social media posts in which Sareee has gone to pain-staking lengths in talking her shit, by talking up the greats of the joshi past and talking down Stardom and its roster (notably Saya Kamitani and Taro Okada have talked about wanting to move away from that same past to build a new future). All that shit talking was laying the groundwork for this “invasion”, which so far has succeeded in getting Stardom crowds to do the thing they usually never do: meaningfully boo a heel. During the match, Sareee reveled in the boos, while simultaneously continuing to encourage fans to cheer for her and upon finding a small number who did, also reveled in those cheers, creating a fun dynamic. The match itself was also a hard hitting, crisp affair and another good showing for Rina in what is her clear break out year, as she unleashed all of her arsenal on Sareee but couldn’t keep her down. Rina’s kick outs in the closing stretch elicited SMILES from Sareee, who may have admired Rina’s moxie but mostly seemed to take joy that each kick out gave her the opportunity to inflict more violence on Rina. This is a match you should seek out to both perfectly illustrate Sareee’s character work, and also to get a peek of the potential Rina is unlocking.

Elsewhere on the Afternoon show, Suzu Suzuki and Momo Watanabe had a “meat” match that Momo won and featured Momo giving a sick apron piledriver to Suzu; Saori Anou dropped a fall to the surging Ami Sourei; Bozilla made easy work of Miyu Amasaki; Ranna Yagami picked up an upset win over Konami; Saya Iida finally got points on the board with her victory over Ruaka; Aya Sakura defeated Juria Hime and HANAKO defeated Momo Kohgo.

On the undercard of the Evening event, Mei Seira and Yuna Mizamori stole the show with a fast paced and hard hitting match with Yuna picking up the win and likely earning another shot at the High Speed title; Starlight Kid and Sayaka Kurara had an entertaining match with SLK, picking up the win but not without letting Kurara shine a little first; Lady C defeated Azusa Inaba; Saya Kamitani stayed undefeated after easily beating Waka Tsukiyama in 40 seconds; Natsuko Tora defeated Rian; and in somewhat of a surprising outcome and also in less than 3 minutes, AZM defeated Natsupoi in a match that was a high speed sprint, and which leaves pre-tournament favorite Poi likely needing to win all her remaining matches to make it into the playoff rounds.

In the semi-main event, Hina and Tomoka Inaba had a match that was objectively good but never hooked me fully – between the outcome never really being in doubt and the crowd wanting to both cheer and boo Hina at all times (true dedication to their hometown girl), and I suspect they have a better match in them, on another day in another town. In the main event, Hanan defeated Bea Priestly in a match that couldn’t better other matches on the card and in which Bea was unable to work at the same level as Hanan. The match structure made sense with an extended control sequence to generate sympathy for Hanan, but it felt slow and dull at points. Hanan’s comeback worked well, however, and her win felt well earned.

Full Results Afternoon

Blue Stars Block A:
Aya Sakura [2] defeats Yuria Hime [0] (5:41)

Blue Stars Block B:
HANAKO [4] defeats Momo Kohgo [0] (8:41)

Blue Stars Block A:
Saya Iida [2] defeats Ruaka [1] (5:05)

Blue Stars Block B:
Ranna Yagami [2] defeats Konami [2] (7:09)

Blue Stars Block A:
Bozilla [5] defeats Miyu Amasaki [2] (5:34)

Blue Stars Block B:
Momo Watanabe [6] defeats Suzu Suzuki [4] (13:12)

Blue Stars Block A:
Ami Sourei [6] defeats Saori Anou [4] (12:25)

Blue Stars Block B:
Sareee [4] defeats Hina [0] (13:03)

Full Results Evening

Red Stars Block A:
Saya Kamitani [8] defeats Waka Tsukiyama [0] (0:40)

Red Stars Block B:
Natsuko Tora [6] defeats Rian [0] (5:38)

Red Stars Block A:
Lady C [4] defeats Azusa Inaba [2] (8:24)

Red Stars Block B:
Starlight Kid [5] defeats Sayaka Kurara [2] (11:21)

Red Stars Block A:
Yuna Mizumori [2] defeats Mei Seira [5] (9:28)

Red Stars Block B:
AZM [5] defeats Natsupoi [4] (2:35)

Red Stars Block B:
Rina [8] defeats Tomoka Inaba [2] (13:24)

Red Stars Block A:
Hanan [5] defeats Bea Priestley [6] (12:20)

© STARDOM

Rina, 18, gave an interview to Weekly Pro Wrestling Magazine (Shupro). She spoke briefly about the concussion she sustained on 4th July off of an innocuous diving crossbody. Rina said that she recalls the match before the spot but has some memory loss following the incident. She explained that she has had that happen before but she was able to finish the match. Rina goes on to say that the fact it happened off of a crossbody has made her realise it can happen at any moment. She also spoke about being inspired to wrestle at the age of 5 when she saw Nanae Takahashi vs Alpha Female in the 2013 5Star Final, and began training soon after. Rina mentioned that she was really excited to be a part of her first 5Star, having missed the previous one due to school studies, despite being a Future of Stardom Champion and New Blood Tag Team Champion. She then spoke about her sisters and expressed happiness that Hina was finally showing more of her personality and developing into a good promo.

Ruaka was pulled out of the 1st August show where she was due to compete against Aya Sakura. It was first announced that she would forfeit her points, but later they changed their mind and rescheduled the match, so it could be that Ruaka was scheduled to win the match and they couldn’t make the booking work.

As we’re doing for Marigold and will do for NOAH’s N-1, here are some matches we’re excited for which should give you a flavour if you’d like to parachute in. As always, your mileage may vary depending on your favourites. We’ll only mention the ones coming up before our next issue:

5Star Grand Prix Standings as of 3rd August (W-L-D)

© NOAH

NOAH

NOAH 25th Anniversary Event “NEW DEPARTURE” Day 1

19th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 1,596
Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe

NOAH means business. Not only did they pack Korakuen Hall two nights in a row on the 19th and 20th of July, but they were super no-vacancy sellouts with no standing room on the balcony available. What a 25th anniversary year NOAH is having, revitalising their product after the depressing 2024. It should now be obvious to anyone with eyes how successful OZAWA’s reign has been. Or I should say, was, as OZAWA is no longer the champion. NOAH tore up the script on the first night of their Korakuen Hall double header, as they boldly turned their backs on the trusted “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” In one of the biggest upsets of the year (funnily the second upset with OZAWA involved), Kenoh knocked out OZAWA with his Super Manji Kick to become the new GHC Heavyweight Champion.

This finish was quite smart, especially considering Kenoh had posted a video on his YouTube 8 days before the match showing his training with Tetsuji Nakano, an expert in a martial art called Taido, and practising the so-called Super Manji Kick. I don’t normally find myself heaping praise on OZAWA for the layouts of his main events, and his in-ring work certainly needs significant improvement to put things together, but in this match, his athletic ceiling was on full display. On this occasion, his usual antics during the match built up perfectly to the spectacle of the KO finish – which will be hard to forget as the chickens had finally come home to roost. OZAWA matches aren’t workrate matches for the puro-pures, and so if workrate isn’t your thing, I could understand not enjoying his matches. For a controversial opinion I’ll stand by: I think that the wrestling on display in the main event was the best form of ‘creating moments.’ If you’re ever going to do a WWE-coded main event – with run-ins, pauses in the action and taunts -then the way Kenoh and OZAWA did it was exactly how it should be done.

As someone who has been incredibly invested in OZAWA’s reign, who was the prime reason why I watched every show in 2025, my initial emotions were anger, frustration and a sense of betrayal. Only five minutes had to pass for me to come to the realisation that this could be what is best for OZAWA and NOAH in the long-term. Well, trying to tell the future is always a fool’s task, but it is fun speculating. Of course, we shouldn’t veer into fantasy booking territory, that’s the easiest way to be disappointed, but we can look at what the most likely scenarios are.

The first thing to note is that Kenoh is no longer the champion – I’m glad I chose to hold off writing anything until after the second night. After knocking out OZAWA, Kenoh called out his KenKen tag team partner, KENTA for a title match the next night. On the second night at Korakuen Hall, KENTA pinned Kenoh after landing the second Go 2 Sleep of the match to win the GHC Heavyweight Championship for the second time since 2014. KENTA returned to NOAH after 2 years on 1st January in a singles match against Kenoh, and formerly teamed up with Kenoh on 13th February, with the two basically being inseparable for KENTA’s first few months back in his home promotion as he got his feet under the table. The strange part is that KENTA had already challenged OZAWA for the title at Ryogoku Kokugikan (Sumo Hall) on 3rd May in an unsuccessful attempt. So where is NOAH going with this?

© NOAH

OZAWA’s Stardom

It feels like the first Sumo Hall show was NOAH testing the waters with a routine card and OZAWA on top in the main event. That show did 4,521, their best post-COVID number, but still off their pre-COVID numbers of 5.5k+ (all Japanese companies have suffered attendance drops post-COVID with recovery only really beginning this year, if at all for some). NOAH recently announced that they will be holding a show at Sumo Hall on 11th October. It is notable as NOAH had not booked any buildings bigger than Korakuen Hall for the rest of 2025, until this announcement. While companies having events close to each other is not unusual in Japan, this event was booked 2 days before New Japan’s annual “King of Pro-Wrestling” show at Sumo Hall on 13th October, which is an unusual time for NOAH to hold a big show. Their last autumn Sumo Hall show was in 2019, drawing 5,523.

NOAH do not want to stay with the status quo – they are not content with being the best drawing promotion at Korakuen Hall in 2025. No, they want to re-take their spot at the top and chase after New Japan while they sense blood in the water. How realistic that is remains to be seen, as there is a lot of ground to cover. However, New Japan’s attendance has been dwindling, with their opening G1 nights in Hokkaido drawing 2,579 and 2,520. Their back-to back-nights in the exact same building for “New Beginning” last year drew 3,300 and 5,355 (the latter was main evented by Naito…yeah, they actually didn’t think he was worth it?) It gets worse, New Japan’s 4th G1 night in Nagaoka, Niigata, drew 1,547, compared to last year’s G1 2024 date drawing 3,022 in the same arena. The 1,547 is worse than their 2020 pandemic number in the same building when they drew 1,685. Yes, you read that right, in 2025, with the IWGP Champion main eventing in a “Wrestle Kingdom” rematch, they drew less than their pandemic number. Both the 2020 and 2024 dates were main evented by Naito.

With New Japan tantalisingly in touch for the first time in a while for NOAH, they are going for broke, parking on New Japan’s turf 2 days before their show in Sumo Hall in October, and trying to create a true superstar. Is OZAWA already a star? Yes. Is he a superstar? Judging by the May Sumo Hall show, no, but he is getting there. NOAH’s latest booking decision is an indication that they have the cojones to pull the trigger and take him there, and they currently do not believe that he needs a long title reign to get there.

© NOAH

The final of N-1 Victory, NOAH’s singles round robin tournament, is on 23rd September at Korakuen Hall. So a likely direction for the October Sumo Hall show is the winner of the N-1 facing the GHC Heavyweight Champion at Sumo Hall. It is an age-old problem in wrestling, the babyface is stronger as a challenger rather than as a champion, and OZAWA had already become the top babyface in the company in the past few months. OZAWA winning the N-1 in his first year entering the tournament and challenging an established NOAH legend at a big Sumo Hall show, whether that would have been Kenoh or KENTA, is good business. It prolongs OZAWA’s star power, rather than let it wane and die out like a white dwarf star, which is what a forever title reign surely would have done. In a way it is surprising, and a testament to OZAWA’s charisma, that he was even able to stay so hot for so long while riding with a stale Team 2000X.

A babyface OZAWA was always the end goal, it was just a matter of when NOAH was going to pull the trigger. These two days at Korakuen Hall have laid the groundwork for a 2026 that may well end up being even more successful than 2025. NOAH have once again shown the confidence that they have in their booking, first on 1st January when they initially pulled the trigger on the OZAWA push, and now again in July, as they look to accelerate OZAWA’s ascension to stardom.

© NOAH

KENTA’s Destiny

Of course, it would be quite typical for all my blurb about OZAWA to be made redundant, and NOAH just ends up running with a year-long KENTA reign with OZAWA toiling away in the midcard. KENTA returning to NOAH in their 25th anniversary year was a big deal. This isn’t the column for it and you could write several articles on KENTA’s history and how it had culminated in the prodigal son’s return. KENTA was there all the way in the beginning of NOAH, debuting the day after their first show, on 6th August 2000. At the start of the show on 20th July, they even had KENTA and Kenoh stand by the legendary Kenta Kobashi as he cut a promo about NOAH’s 25th anniversary, and he later joined them at ringside for their match. KENTA has been teaming with Kenoh very often in the very “KenKen” tag team since January, and Kenoh really helped KENTA get his feet under the table during his return to the company. Kenoh was KENTA’s first match back in NOAH in 2 years. Kenoh versus KENTA for the title was an inevitability.

You might think “great, another company chasing nostalgia,” but KENTA has been the second most over person on every show after OZAWA. He’s not treated as a washed up has-been like he may have been treated on the New Japan STRONG shows. He’s treated like an absolute star, whether he actually is one or not isn’t really the point. His match versus Kenoh proved that he can still show glimpses of his old self in fleeting moments. The only question is why they did not pull the trigger on 3rd May when they booked OZAWA versus KENTA in Sumo Hall. I do not have an obvious answer to that, although there are several possibilities. It may simply be that OZAWA threw a wrench in their plans and they were surprised by OZAWA’s drawing ability. Or maybe they wanted to stretch out OZAWA’s reign until the 25th Anniversary shows, and kick off KENTA’s reign in symbolic fashion. The more likely answer is that now heading into the N-1, Kenoh has 1 win over OZAWA (and one no contest), OZAWA has 1 win over KENTA, and KENTA has 1 win over Kenoh. Between the three, there are a lot of intriguing stories they could tell in that tournament rather than if KENTA had just beaten OZAWA in a one-and-done and in particular, OZAWA now has strong storylines with every single top player in NOAH right now: Kaito, Kenoh and KENTA. That would not be possible had they just done the switch on 3rd May, and it is about sowing seeds for the long-term. People often forget, titles are there to tell stories – this isn’t actually a real sport, titles don’t actually mean the titleholder is the #1 guy in the company. They’re a storytelling device, and NOAH knows that and can now use these title changes as a launching pad for OZAWA’s future.

The most worrying scenario would be that their full focus was on how to get the title on KENTA with no plan for OZAWA afterwards. It will be exciting to find out whether that is the case or not. OZAWA received a superstar reaction the night after losing the title when he hopped over the railing to help Kaito lose, so that’s our first taste of whether OZAWA not having the title will hurt him. Launching OZAWA into a feud with Kaito would be extremely smart because that is a feud that does not need the title and they are the perfect dance partners. It’s a way to keep both hot while giving KENTA his time in the sun.

With KENTA as champion, and OZAWA kept hot leading to an eventual title chase, NOAH may well just have their cake and eat it. You don’t get dream scenarios like this without taking risks. Alongside OZAWA: Kaito is still 29, Owadasan is stupidly over and will come back from a planned excursion as a big babyface, and Odashima will run the junior heavyweight division one day. Oh and they still have Yoshiki Inamura in NXT purgatory waiting to return.

Despite all the speculation, one thing is for sure. NOAH has found a way to dramatically heat up the N-1 this year on the road to Sumo Hall in October, and Nippon Budokan (not announced but presumably) in January.

The Show

Nevertheless, all the analysis for the future aside, on the first night there was no other draw on this card except the main event. People were there to see Kenoh vs. OZAWA, and they have both worked hard to build this up as a big match on short notice (a month) using social media. As an example, on the 17th July, OZAWA ambushed Kenoh on ABEMA’s live broadcast “NOAH TIME LIVE”. The show featured an in-depth look at the upcoming title match between the two, with Kenoh appearing as a studio guest. OZAWA burst into the studio with a steel chair, attacking Kenoh before sitting on top of him calling him a pig, spanking him and mocking him, mimicking the pictures he posted online of Kenoh being sat on top of by a woman. OZAWA then turned to their guest, actress Yuka Murayuma, and said “You were scared right? Sorry, after the 19th let’s go on a date again.” She replied that she had never been on a date with him. Kenoh ran out of the show, chasing OZAWA. OZAWA humiliating and tormenting Kenoh over the past month played into the KO finish.

This match had a big match feel. OZAWA started the match in the same way he had been during the preview tags: taunting Kenoh by recording him on his phone. As has been happening recently at Korakuen, OZAWA had significant support from the crowd, although it was more mixed than in his last defence, with Kenoh’s popularity cutting through OZAWA’s charm. OZAWA stepped it up a notch by taking one of the TV cameras to film Kenoh in pain. He made sure to also film Yuka Murayuma who was at the desk, maybe hoping he could land that date. Kenoh had to constantly battle getting booed, especially when cutting off OZAWA’s dance routine, so much so that he had to pull out his own break-dancing for cheers. Kenoh was done playing around and pulled out his reliable weapon – his range of deadly kicks. It was hard for the crowd not to cheer Kenoh kicking the snot out of OZAWA.

Team 2000X began interfering in the match as OZAWA followed up with a tope con giro to the outside, almost knocking his head on the apron. One of OZAWA’s gimmicks is stealing the moves and taunts of his opponents, like a really charismatic Kirby. After landing a missile and shotgun dropkick combination, the champion locked in the Kenoh Special on the challenger, with Kenoh struggling before breaking the hold. Kenoh, familiar with OZAWA’s arsenal because of their many tag matches throughout the year, rolled out of the way of OZAWA’s moonsault and subsequent Shooting Star Press before snapping OZAWA to the mat with a dragon suplex.

Kenoh continued to have OZAWA’s number, shoving OZAWA onto the ringpost when he wanted to hit the Real Rebel, with Kenoh following up with a combo of headbutts. Kenoh, at a tantalisingly slow pace, put both hands behind OZAWA’s neck, locking in the full-nelson hold with both on the top rope. At this precarious position, Kenoh flipped backwards, launching OZAWA with a brutal top rope dragon suplex, with OZAWA barely rotating enough and just missing landing on his head for the second time in the match. There was a terrifying moment when Kenoh hit the P.F.S. (double foot stomp) and the ref counted 2 when he was pulled out by 2000X, but his hand connected with the mat for 3 by accident. I thought that was the finish and gasped. Of course at the time, I didn’t realise there was actually a chance OZAWA could lose.

After some 2000X shenanigans, OZAWA kicked Kenoh down under, right in the nuts. This rallied the fans firmly behind Kenoh. OZAWA in his usual bratish manner spammed Kenoh taunts like he was in a video game, before hitting Kenoh with his own P.F.S. OZAWA deliberately did one of the longest range stomps I’ve seen, just to stick it to Kenoh. The referee recovered from the earlier bump and slowly rolled back into the ring for a 2 count.

They did really well incorporating the story beats from earlier in the match and playing off of what OZAWA’s character is all about. The more I watched it back, recovered from the initial stress of the title change, the more I loved the match as it had a lot of small details rewarding those who had followed the build-up. OZAWA tried to go for the Real Rebel a second time, which no one had kicked out of, but once again Kenoh rolled out of the way. OZAWA, like always when he doesn’t know what else to do, started stealing more of Kenoh’s moves, this time a Pele kick, but a double footed one which looked more spectacular than any of Kenoh’s one. The absolute cheek. His absurd athleticism is the main reason I think that he is still nowhere near his ceiling as a performer. Kenoh went into a fit of rage. The mockery, the taunting, the humiliation on social media. It all had built up to this. He now wanted to knock OZAWA out and he would not compromise on that goal. Blind with rage, he kicked OZAWA around the side of the head and waited for the ref to confirm he was knocked out, but no cigar. Kenoh then pulled out the Super Manji Kick, knocking OZAWA out cleanly. The referee called the match and everyone, including myself, were in shock at what we had just witnessed.

In the semi-main event, YO-HEY defended his GHC Junior Heavyweight Championship against his long-time “Blond Couple” tag partner, HAYATA, a 5-time champion himself. The two were involved in heated brawls leading up to this match. This match told a different story though, a story of two wrestlers who knew each other intimately and employed a series of counters against each other. The only way one of them was going to win was to bring out something big. YO-HEY tried to go for the double knees from the top rope, but was countered with a huge sit-out powerbomb. YO-HEY blocked HAYATA’s Headache (kneeling Frankensteiner), countering with a dropkick to stagger HAYATA, and a second one to down him for a nearfall. The crowd was split between the two and couldn’t decide who they wanted to win. YO-HEY punted HAYATA with two superkicks before climbing the ropes. YO-HEY’s Bamboo Dragonfly (corkscrew splash) missed slightly, but connected enough to pick up the win. After the match, YO-HEY referred to HAYATA as his wife, as he always does, before HAYATA announced their divorce. YO-HEY begrudgingly accepted, so no litigation needed. New Japan’s Hiromu Takahashi came out to challenge YO-HEY for 20th July, in quite a saucy promo as they spoke about licking each other. (Editor’s Note: Well, that was a quick rebound.)

Go Shiozaki made an unannounced appearance, his first since 13th January when he suffered a knee injury. Shiozaki announced that he would return on 11th August in Kawasaki. He will face Harutoki on his return, which will be a singles match for a spot in the N-1.

The undercard felt stronger than usual, which was buoyed by a great crowd. The crowd was hot for Junta Miyawaki & KENTA facing off against Daiki Odashima & Naomichi Marufuji in the opener. The big news was that Daiki finally got a big win after 10 months, pinning Junta to a very large crowd pop. I would have preferred it if it was in a singles match with Owadasan or something like that, but I’ll take any Daiki love I can get. Daiki was so fun to watch in this match. After an initial grappling sequence, Junta did the usual ‘stare at each other’ spot, but Daiki just dropkicked him, three times. This was a good opener that set the tone for the rest of the show. One of the strongest tag teams right now, Los Golpeadores, teamed with Super Crazy clashing with Hajime Ohara, Shuhei Taniguchi and Will Kroos. I would just like to see Kroos go up against Los Golpeadores in handicap matches for the next few months as he was a great base for the two. There were a lot of crazy spots, including as always, Kroos’ running senton. Bane pinned Ohara with the Shooting Star Press.

Knull was revealed to be Team 2000X’s new member, as he teamed with the returning Jack Morris, Owadsan & Tadasuke to take on All Rebellion (Alejandro, Galeno, Harutoki & Kaito Kiyomiya). Knull’s previous tour with NOAH was from 8th March to 27th April. Knull destroyed Alejandro with a Choke Bomb.

Full Results

Daiki Odashima & Naomichi Marufuji defeat Junta Miyawaki & KENTA (12:51)

Alpha Wolf, Dragon Bane & Super Crazy defeat Hajime Ohara, Shuhei Taniguchi & Will Kroos (9:36)

Passionate RATEL’S (Daiki Inaba, Manabu Soya, Saxon Huxley & Yuto Kikuchi) defeat AMAKUSA, Black Menso-re, Eita & Ulka Sasaki (9:45)

Team 2000X (Daga & Takashi Sugiura) defeat Atsushi Kotoge & Tetsuya Endo (9:12)

Team 2000X (Jack Morris, Knull, Owadasan & Tadasuke) defeat All Rebellion (Alejandro, Galeno, Harutoki & Kaito Kiyomiya) (11:59)

GHC Junior Heavyweight Title:
YO-HEY (c) defeats HAYATA (14:55)

GHC Heavyweight Title:
Kenoh defeats OZAWA (c) by referee’s decision (22:11)

© NOAH

NOAH 25th Anniversary Event “NEW DEPARTURE” Day 2

20th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 1,592
Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe

Since we’ve already broken down the result in the previous column, we’ll keep this show’s recap relatively short. The crowd seemed even hotter than the night before, although the action was much more muted.

The main event between KENTA and Kenoh started off slowly, before ramping with stiff slaps and trading kicks to the back. KENTA was fired up for this. It was the best KENTA has looked in years and he did not hold back his strikes. The action did slow down significantly when KENTA was grounding Kenoh with holds, and KENTA still does not move as fast as he used to (obviously). Kenoh landed a P.F.S. to KENTA on the outside before KENTA turned the tables by delivering a draping DDT and a P.F.S. Kenoh rallied with a series of kicks and his signature Dragon Suplex. There was a bit of a messy exchange as KENTA had to try twice to hit his G2S, which Kenoh blocked on the second attempt to deliver a headkick and a bridging dragon suplex for a near fall. KENTA successfully hit the G2S for one of the closest nearfalls (botches) you’ll ever see, with the referee counting 3 but it was treated as a 2.99. After almost fading from a Kenoh Special and having to absorb another P.F.S., KENTA held on and kicked out. Kenoh went for his super finisher, Enrin (backflip double foot stomp) but landed on his feet and was met by KENTA’s Busaiku knee. KENTA sprinted at the ropes as fast as he could and connected with another Busaiku knee. Alas, it was another nearfall that the crowd bit on.

© NOAH

Both competitors got to their knees and started slapping each other as hard as they could, before rising slowly to their feet, still with no give in their strikes. KENTA dropped Kenoh with an open-handed strike, teasing the KO finish in a callback to the night before, but KENTA picked him up and continued his flurry of strikes, downing Kenoh again. KENTA picked him up a second time to continue the onslaught. KENTA could sense Kenoh’s spirit dying and pressed his advantage, landing a trio of kicks to the head, for the third close nearfall of the fight. Everyone in the crowd had their phones out as KENTA landed a second G2S for the win.

After the match, KENTA dissolved the KenKen tag, telling Kenoh it was better if they stood across each other instead. KENTA reassured Kenoh that he wasn’t breaking up with him because of his awful breakdancing the night before. Kenoh agreed. Marufuji came out after the match to challenge KENTA in what will be a filler Korakuen Hall defence on 16th August. Marufuji’s promo was sweet and heartfelt, saying that the reason he has stayed in NOAH so long was to wait for KENTA’s return, for a day where he could challenge him for the title. KENTA replied that he doesn’t want the Marufuji that’s nurturing the youngsters, he wants the strongest version of Marufuji, to which Marufuji told him not to worry. That will be their first singles match since Marufuji’s 20th anniversary event in 2018 when KENTA was in WWE going by ‘Hideo Itami’ (my god, what a time). Marufuji backstage said that it was fate, and in his pro wrestling life, KENTA was “irreplaceable.” Marufuji explained that he just missed the boat on challenging OZAWA, but respects his talent and ability to draw, but still thinks of him as a rookie.

In the semi-main event, AMAKUSA reunited with New Japan’s Hiromu Takahashi to take on GHC Junior Heavyweight Champion YO-HEY & Yuto Kikuchi. The novelty was fun, but this was mostly a house show match with nothing notable happening except the result. Hiromu pinned YO-HEY. After the match they set up a title match for 11th August. There was definitely a homoerotic energy between the two. They both kept alluding to wanting to taste each other, and Hiromu had “taste together” written on his wrist tape.

All Rebellion (Alejandro, Galeno, Harutoki, Kai Fujimura & Kaito Kiyomiya) battled with Team 2000X (Daga, Knull, Jack Morris, Owadasan & Tadasuke) in an elimination tag match. The match came down to Owadasan and Kaito. There was a huge pop for Owadasan versus Kaito, including some Owadasan chants. As Owadasan was facing off with Kaito, we saw a glimpse of Dark Kaito, who debuted against OZAWA at their title match on 18th May. OZAWA came out to destroy Kaito, delivering a Real Rebel and allowing Owadasan to easily eliminate him.

After the match, OZAWA said that he blamed the referee for the match yesterday. He believed the referee was bought off and represented the dark side of the NOAH dojo. He said that he’ll never forgive Kenoh for having to resort to such tactics. The crowd was cheering him during this promo. He did his gimmick of putting over Owadasan and told Owadasan that he was very strong in the elimination match and then bowed to him and handed him the mic, using honorifics to address him. OZAWA has always said in promos that Owadasan is above everyone else in a very Shun Skywalker-like fashion. After receiving loud “Owadasan” chants, Owadasan said that as there’s no one on his level in Japan so he is going on an excursion. OZAWA asked Owadasan to teach him professional wrestling, and so they set up a singles match for next month’s Korakuen on 16th August. OZAWA bowed and thanked him. This entire promo was a babyface promo, hinting at the direction they might be taking with OZAWA and why the title change happened. Both OZAWA and Owadasan are pretty much top babyfaces in NOAH despite being part of a heel faction.

One of the most fun trios anywhere, Endo & Los Golpeadores faced Eita, Marufuji and Shuji Kondo. At one point Dragon Bane sprinted at Alpha Wolf to get monkey flipped into the opponent in the corner. Eita pinned Bane in what was a very Dragongate-like six-man (which is a compliment). This match was to set up Eita and Kondo, who have held the GHC Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championships before, to challenge Los Golpeadores for their title.

In the opener, the crowd was on fire. The Daikis had another shot at each other in a repeat of their singles match on 6th July; although this time, Odashima had the confidence of picking up his first-ever pin the night before. Soya drank a Genki energy drink. The crowd were ready to explode when Odashima teased tossing Huxley with a side suplex. Odashima hit Huxley with a Frankensteiner for a nearfall that the crowd thought there was a 3 count on – alas, Odashima was pinned by Huxley moments later.

Full Results

Mohammed Yone & Super Crazy defeat Junta Miyawaki & Ulka Sasaki (5:24)

Passionate RATEL’S (Daiki Inaba, Manabu Soya & Saxon Huxley) defeat Daiki Odashima, Kazuyuki Fujita & Will Kroos (6:42)

Eita, Naomichi Marufuji & Shuji Kondo defeat Alpha Wolf, Dragon Bane & Tetsuya Endo (8:45)

Ten Man Tag Team Elimination:
Knull & Team 2000X (Daga, Jack Morris, Owadasan & Tadasuke) defeat All Rebellion (Alejandro, Galeno, Harutoki, Kai Fujimura & Kaito Kiyomiya) [5-4] (13:29)

AMAKUSA & Hiromu Takahashi defeat Passionate RATEL’S (YO-HEY & Yuto Kikuchi) (10:56)

GHC Heavyweight Title:
KENTA defeats Kenoh (c) (28:04)

NOAH House Show Notes

On 6th July, Daiki Odashima teamed with Naomichi Marufuji to take on Tetsuya Endo and Will Kroos. They teased us as Odashima tagged out when Kroos tagged in when I really wanted to see some more Odashima-Kroos interactions. Marufuji slowed down the pace painfully. I eventually got what I wanted as Odashima tried to suplex Kroos but was swatted away. Kroos’ senton once again got the loudest pop of the night, even though it missed. Odashima, sensing the moment, tried to go for a diving crossbody but was caught and then put away with Kroos’ piledriver for the finish. Calibus appeared rocked when a headscissors by Junta Miyawaki went a bit wrong, although it could just have been excellent selling. He tagged out and seemed fine later when he did a reverse senton to the outside.

On 12th July, NOAH held the 8th show this year that had taken place at Yokohama Radiant Hall. Calibus looked a lot smoother this time out, having a good match with Junta Miyawaki. There was an all-PASSIONATE RATEL’s tag, building up both the upcoming GHC Junior Heavyweight Championship and the GHC Tag Team Championship matches, as Daiki Inaba & YO-HEY faced off against HAYATA & Manabu Soya. There were really stiff chops and a lot of brawling in the crowd between HAYATA & YO-HEY, before Inaba & Soya demanded that they settle it in the ring. This match was pretty good. Only one note from the semi-main: Kroos was so over with the NOAH crowd. In the main event, Daiki Odashima was thrown back into the Team 2000X vortex in a main event spot. Owadasan spit oolong tea into KENTA’s face, mirroring the incident that happened to KENTA last month. The match was structured to build up to Odashima’s hot tag (yes, really!). Owadasan pinned Odashima. Radiant Hall shows are super fun because the crowd is always really hot. After the match, OZAWA posted an embarrassing photo of Kenoh online, where someone is sitting on him like a chair. Kenoh was furious. Spoiler: this played into the title change! Sometimes parachuting into title matches does take away from how good they are.

On 13th July, Galeno defended his GHC National Championship against Will Kroos in a meaty match-up. The match started out with the super heavyweights feeling each other out with forearms, attempted shoulder tackles and attempted body slams. Kroos scored the first body slam of the match before landing his horrifying running senton. The last few minutes of this match were great. There was a crazy Spanish Fly spot from the top rope. Moments later, Kroos climbed the ropes again but was thrown into the ring with a superplex by Galeno. Galeno slammed Kroos with a Michinoku Driver for a nearfall. A second Michinoku Driver dropped Kroos on his head, and rightfully, that was the violent finish to the match. Elsewhere on the show, Takashi Sugiura choked out Daiki Inaba ahead of their GHC Tag Team Championship match.

On 26th July, NOAH held a show at the famous KBS Hall in Kyoto. Kaito and OZAWA faced off in tag team action, with each Team 2000X member getting loud cheers against Kaito, although he did not get boos himself. Kaito won with the Skywalker elbow on Owadasan. Earlier Owadasan had pulled his tights to try to roll him up, accidentally exposing his rear. Backstage, OZAWA and Owadasan blamed the loss on Owadasan being put off his game by Kaito’s ass…Los Golpeadores teamed up with Naomichi Marufuji taking on Eita, Kenoh & Tetsuya Endo. This match was good, but I find myself repeating that with almost every Golpeadores match. Eita had his work boots on in this match, he seems to have found a new gear against Golpeadores. He pinned Bane with Imperial Uno, building up to their GHC Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Title match.

In the main event, Daiki Inaba & Manabu Soya retained the GHC Heavyweight Tag Team Title against Daga & “The Godfather” Takashi Sugiura. This match was awesome. It was almost by accident, as Inaba shoot headbutted The Godfather and immediately started bleeding, dripping all over his face, which created a gruesome visual. He played his role perfectly as a fiery, passionate underdog babyface and the blood really added to the struggle he was trying to convey. He was the star of the match by far. This is my joint top match from NOAH house shows in 2025, and overall only behind Kaito/OZAWA I, Kenoh/OZAWA and Kenoh/KENTA. Yoshi Tatsu teased bringing in Team 2000X’s “Chairman” as they accused PASSIONATE RATEL’S of bribing the referee (as OZAWA did with the Kenoh KO).

On 27th July, NOAH ran their yearly show in Ishikawa’s Industrial Hall #3, drawing 1,141 compared to 1,316 last year. The crowd was very quiet, with Jack Morris trying his best to warm the crowd up and get behind Daiki. PASSIONATE RATEL’S (Daiki Inaba, Manabu Soya & Saxon Huxley) took on Team 2000X (Daga, OZAWA & Takashi Sugiura), and once again, Inaba was almost immediately bleeding. It happened off camera as he was brawling with Sugiura, possibly hard way from being thrown into the post. This guy is insane. OZAWA then bit the wound, leaving blood all over his mouth. Sugiura and Inaba have been outstanding together on these past two shows. This crowd did not deserve this match. The main event was a good, but skippable, six-man tag with Los Golpeadores & Naomichi Marufuji against AMAKUSA, Eita and Kaito Kiyomiya.

NOAH News & Upcoming Shows

Mohammed Yone announced his 30th anniversary show on 25th August at Korakuen Hall. The first announced match was Daisuke Ikeda, Mohamed Yone, Naomichi Marufuji vs. Atsushi Kotoge, Go Shiozaki & Shuji Ishikawa.

On 24th July, NOAH announced that YO-HEY suffered an orbital bone fracture in his left eye. YO-HEY’s GHC Junior Heavyweight Championship match against Hiromu Takahashi, originally scheduled for 11th August in Kawasaki, will be postponed. Instead Yuto Kikuchi will take on Hiromu in Kawasaki. Also on the 11th August show will be Go Shiozaki facing Harutoki for a spot in the N-1.

On 3rd August in Kobe Sambo Hall, Los Golpeadores will defend their GHC Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Titles against Eita & Shuji Kondo, and Daiki Odashima will take on Owadasan in a match up marked on my calendar.

NOAH’s next Korakuen Hall show is on 16th August, headlined by KENTA defending his GHC Heavyweight Championship against Naomichi Marufuji.

© TJPW

Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling

Summer Sun Princess 2025

21st July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 1,384
Ota City General Gymnasium, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe

Just a week after their wildly successful US tour, TJPW returned home to Tokyo to Ota City General Gymnasium with an attendance of 1,384 which would be their best ever Ota City Gym attendance, although not close to a sellout. Their Dallas show was one of their best shows of 2025, so the expectations were high heading into “Summer Sun Princess”. TJPW had two guests rolled out for the big show: Saki Akai, who was Yuki Arai’s tag team partner before retiring in 2023, and Mai Asada, a famous ice figure skater who was making her 3rd appearance as a guest on TJPW. The novelty of the Dallas show with almost double the crowd makes it difficult to compare the two, but overall “Summer Sun Princess” stood tall in its own right as yet another successful TJPW show in 2025.

The show was main evented by the Princess of Princess Champion, Mizuki, making her 3rd successful defence against the challenger, Yuki Arai. Despite debuting in 2021, Arai’s growth has been stalled by splitting her responsibilities with her former idol group, SKE48. Arai recently left that group to pursue full-time wrestling, with the “Summer Sun Princess” main event as her first major challenge. Her wrestling remains quite basic compared to the top workers in TJPW, but her improvement in the last few months is noticeable. This was a good match, although not on the level of Mizuki’s other big main events, such as with Miu, of course. Mizuki would be a tall mountain for Arai to climb; indeed, it would prove to be too tall. Mizuki did not look like she came out to play as she was not all smiles and cuteness, giving Arai some stiff forearms to start proceedings, as well as a double foot stomp on the outside. The story of this match, however, was how well Arai could utilise her signature big boot, as she kept on halting Mizuki in her path, leaving her to figure out how to counter it.

© TJPW

Early on, Mizuki was in full control until Arai’s big boot knocked her off the turnbuckle, and then another boot knocked her off the apron. Arai noticed Mizuki’s lack of ability to deal with the weapon and launched another flurry of big boots at Mizuki, who was perched in the corner of the ring. Mizuki even tried the aerial route and went for a diving crossbody but ended up being shot down by, you guessed it, Arai’s boot. If you were doing a drinking game on how many boots Arai would hit, you would be drunk 10 minutes into the match. Following Mizuki coming crashing down to Earth, Arai locked in the full-nelson hold and launched Mizuki into the air and back down into the mat. Eventually, Mizuki realised that Arai struggled to recover after Mizuki’s double footed stomps, with the most lethal coming after she bridged Arai in the corner middle ropes and plummeted into Arai’s midsection with two feet. Mizuki grounded Arai with a drawn out crossface, with Arai smartly rolling Mizuki over into a pin to break it. Mizuki was impressed and smiled, allowing Arai back to her feet. Arai must’ve thought Mizuki was stupid for allowing her on her feet, but Mizuki was two steps ahead and sprinted at Arai while she was still kneeling, stomping her back down onto the ground.

Arai teased “Finally”, her axe kick that could use some workshopping, but Mizuki dodged it. Mizuki then believed enough was enough and ran at Arai, jumping at least a few feet into the air and double stomping a standing Arai into the ground. Mizuki, in the ascendancy, followed up with Whirling Candy for a near fall. Mizuki and Arai locked into a thudding forearm exchange before Arai used a boot. Mizuki decided that would be the last boot she would eat, hit a Cutie Special (sort of, not really), a missile dropkick and a proper Cutie Special for the win. A really good main event for Arai’s current level.

© TJPW

In one of the most anticipated matches on the card, Kyoraku Kyomei (Hyper Misao & Shoko Nakajima) successfully defended their Princess Tag Team Championships against the reunited Daydream (Miu Watanabe & Rika Tatsumi). Before the match, Misao said they were looking for a clean fight and wanted to beat Daydream fair and square, so she put her usual can in the middle of the ring and asked referee Matsui to take it away. She had a second can in her boots that she sprayed Daydream with to kick off the chaotic, very Misao-like, start of the fight. The build up heavily involved Daydream using sasumatas to keep Kyomei at bay as they believe Misao is a criminal. The sasumatas quickly made an appearance as Miu carried Shoko around on one. One of the sasumatas went flying and hit referee Matsui, allowing Daydream to use them as weapons as they gave an airplane spin to Misao and a giant swing to Shoko with the sasumatas. Matsui revived from the dead and confiscated the weapons. Daydream later regained possession of the sasumatas and used them to stop Misao’s bike.

After an 18 count, the wrestling finally began and was great. Miu and Shoko faced off, one week after their excellent bout in Dallas. These two have incredible chemistry, such that their chain wrestling looks like it’s at 2x speed. I could watch these two wrestle forever, they’re one of those rare wrestling soulmate pairings and these short sequences between the two were my highlight of the whole show. Rika tried to destroy Shoko’s left leg with a series of dragon screws, including delivering one after catching Shoko’s 619. Misao tried her best to hold on as she was put in a giant swing and received Rika’s hip attack, with much of the story of the match being how much Misao could keep up with three of TJPW’s elite workers. Shoko eventually received the hot tag, but immediately Rika went back to the dragon screw on Shoko’s left leg. Miu delivered a thudding double handed chop to Shoko, playing once again into her aggressive side that she had done so in Dallas.

© TJPW

Miu is still fiercely underrated. She’s still only 25 and does not have a single hole in her game. Miu picked up both Misao and Shoko, milking the moment before hitting a double body slam. Misao frantically stopped the pin as Shoko suffered a Tear Drop and Dragon Twist of Fate combination. Miu and Shoko’s chemistry was again a joy and on display for all to see, as Shoko countered another Tear Drop with a headscissors into a 619, and then followed up with a sick Northern Lights suplex. All four participants took in the moment, just staring at each other, before they commenced throwing hands. Miu has one of the most beautiful powerslams in the game, as she caught Shoko out. Kyomei shook off the cobwebs and hit Daydream with a DDT and Facebuster combination, before Shoko closed it out with a diving senton. My match of the night, and an excellent bout. TJPW is oddly shunned for not being a high workrate promotion, but Miu, Shoko and on occasion Rika, simply cannot be denied. Misao did not stick out in this match and did well to keep up with the wrestling portion of the match.

Moka Miyamoto defeated Suzume to win the International Princess Title in their 3rd ever singles match, the last taking place in 2022. To be honest, I struggled with this match, especially after watching their preview tags where they looked amazing together. There were a few rough early spots during their rope running that took me out of the match and made it difficult for me to get back into it. Things did turn around when Suzume pulled out a really cool looking rope walk facebuster. Suzume tried to catch Moka with Ring A Bell, but Moka held on so Suzume had to compromise with a kneeling cutter. Moments later, Moka swung Suzume with Korokan for the win. A solid match, but they surely have better in them.

Billie Starkz returned to Japan, for the first time since “Grand Princess” in March 2023, taking on Miyu Yamashita. Both are very familiar with each other from their match-ups on the US independent scene. Early on there was a scary moment where Billie gave Miyu an Alabama Slam on the apron and Miyu fell a bit short. She continued the match so could’ve just missed her head, but it did look like she bumped on her head. Miyu returned the favour delivering an Attitude Adjustment to the outside of the ring. This match was fine, although it felt like Miyu had to slow down for Billie, who seemed like she was not used to Miyu’s style in Japan. They tried going a bit long and it would’ve worked better as a sprint. Miyu’s strikes were as good as ever and she looked like a million bucks. Miyu launched Billie into the turnbuckle with a wheelbarrow German suplex before hitting a running knee for the win. They both spoke backstage at how familiar they are with each other, and how much they enjoy wrestling each other.

© TJPW

ChocoPro’s Emi Sakura teamed up with DDT’s former KO-D Openweight Champion Chris Brookes in an interpromotional match against New Japan’s El Desperado and Maki Itoh in a special tag match. Despe has some time off New Japan due to the ongoing G1. Chris Brookes last faced off against Despe in an awesome Hardcore match exactly one year prior at DDT’s “Peter Pan” show on 21st July 2024. Despe was in comedy mode (was there ever any doubt?) as he learnt and performed Itoh’s entrance routine. As a DDT fan, this match was for me, and it was awesome. If you haven’t watched DDT, this was laid out exactly like a DDT match. Brookes and Despe were the perfect comedy duo. Sakura got her nose busted open when Brookes accidentally kicked her at the start of the fight. Schadenfreude International’s mascot, Bunbun, flipped off Itoh, so Itoh chucked him into the crowd, but don’t worry – he’s used to that by now. This was just a really good, solid intergender tag match with a bit of everything for everyone, so I’d recommend it highly. Brookes was excellent in this match. After Sakura blasted Itoh with a lariat, the crowd rallied behind Itoh. Itoh flipped off Sakura in defiance, but a Queen’s Gambit put Itoh away for the 3 count.

Jada Stone returned to TJPW for the first time since signing a TNA contract, teaming up with Arisu Endo to take on Haru Kazashiro & Yuki Aino and VENY & Yuki Kamifuku in a three-way tag team match. VENY has tagged with Kamiyu 7 times out of her 11 TJPW appearances and has faced her in a singles match. VENY and Kamiyu came out to Lady Gaga’s ‘Telephone’ song looking like stars. This match was quite good with VENY and Kamiyu playing the big bullies. Kazashiro showed her guts as she stood up to VENY with dropkicks, before receiving a thunderous elbow. Some miscommunication led to VENY and Kamiyu knocking each other down with boots. They later came back wreaking havoc with leg lariats, spinning heel kicks, moonsaults and a superplex. Once again, Kazashiro was the hero, delivering a Fisherman’s suplex to Kamiyu, clearing the way for Aino to slam Endo with her Venus DDT but Endo countered with a roll-up into a superkick. Aino finally hit a UBV to Endo for the win.

© TJPW

Diana’s owner Kyoko Inoue made her first appearance in TJPW after being brought in as a replacement for Max The Impaler due to health issues. Andreza the Giant Panda teamed up with the sleepy Raku for a fun comedy match. Andreza really looked like they were struggling in this match. To be fair to the gimmick, my partner walked in on this match and could not stop laughing at Andreza, so it does work for showing non-wrestling fans the joy of the art. Andreza pinned Pom after a thudding shoot headbutt. They must’ve been training with Ice Ribbon’s champion, Manami Katsu.

In the opener, the new rookie Ren Konatsu teamed up with HIMAWARI to face the Up Up Girls team of Shinzo Suzuki and Uta Takami. Ren is quite a good rookie and does not look as green as you’d expect. If I were ranking rookies in the scene right now, Ren wouldn’t quite be at the top of the list but would comfortably be within the top 10. It feels like she has already caught up to some of the less skilled workers on the TJPW roster. Suzuki pulled out a nice belly-to-belly suplex, but it was HIMAWARI’s team that came out on top as she pinned Takami with Sunflower Tempest.

Full Results

HIMAWARI & Ren Konatsu defeat Shino Suzuki & Uta Takami (10:06)

Andreza Giant Panda & Raku defeat Kyoko Inoue & Pom Harajuku (9:41)

Kira Summer, Mifu Ashida, Toga & Wakana Uehara defeat Chika Nanase, Kaya Toribami, Mahiro Kiryu & Yuna Manase (11:27)

Haru Kazashiro & Yuki Aino defeat Arisu Endo & Jada Stone and VENY & Yuki Kamifuku (12:09)

Chris Brookes & Emi Sakura defeat El Desperado & Maki Itoh (12:36)

Miyu Yamashita defeats Billie Starkz (15:45)

International Princess Title:
Moka Miyamoto defeats Suzume (c) (12:55)

Princess Tag Team Title:
Kyoraku Kyomei (Hyper Misao & Shoko Nakajima) (c) defeat Hakuchumu (Miu Watanabe & Rika Tatsumi) (25:32)

Princess Of Princess Title:
Mizuki (c) defeats Yuki Arai (21:35)

© TJPW

Tokyo Princess Cup Round 1

27th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 281
Shinjuku FACE, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe

The full bracket for the Tokyo Princess Cup was released at a press conference on 17th July, with the first round matches held on 27th July at Shinjuku FACE.

In the main event, Yuki Aino had an uphill battle to climb against Princess of Princess Champion Mizuki. After defending her title at Summer Sun Princess, Mizuki said that if she wins the tournament, she would like to defend her title against both Aino and Shoko as they had both called her out. Mizuki was off to a good start for that goal, as she beat Aino in the first round. The first ten minutes of the fight were even with both struggling to stay on top, before Aino got what she was looking for, landing a side suplex from the outside to the inside of the ring. Aino followed up with a spinning Venus DDT which the crowd thought would finish the fight, but Mizuki held on before slamming Aino down with the Cutie Special for the win.

© TJPW

Miu Watanabe overcame the troublesome sleepy Raku to move through to the next round of the tournament. Raku hypnotised Miu to sleep outside the ring and then placed a trail of Miu’s favourite chocolates leading outside of the arena, in the hope of winning by count out. At the 18 count, Raku put a cone on Miu’s head so she couldn’t see, but Miu rolled back into the ring in just enough time. Miu was not happy and dominated much of the match, despite Raku trying to Mongolian chop Miu to death. Raku tried to even things up by putting the cone on Miu’s head once again, but Miu still managed to swing Raku around with the cone obscuring her vision. Miu put Raku away with a Tear Drop.

Suzume faced Wakana Uehara, with their last singles match taking place in February 2023. Wakana had to fight most of the battle from underneath as Suzume looked confident, taking control of most of the match. Wakana fended off Suzume’s Ring A Bell and held Suzume down with the jack-knife pin for the upset win. Out of all the possible upsets, this was one I had thought there was 0% chance of happening.

Miyu Yamashita was due to wrestle Moka Miyamoto, who was coming off an International Princess Championship win at “Summer Sun Princess”. At the press conference, weirdly, Miyu cut a promo on Rika Tatsumi, who is on the opposite side of the bracket. Miyu said they last had their singles match in 2021 in front of an empty crowd and they’ve both grown since then so wanted to face her again. If that happens, it would have to be in the final. Miyu ignoring Moka in her comments was perhaps deliberate, as they later announced Moka was ill and so Miyu got a bye.

Full Results

Tokyo Princess Cup 2025 First Round:
Miyu Yamashita defeats Moka Miyamoto by forfeit

Chika Nanase, Ivy Steele, Kira Summer & Uta Takami defeat Kaya Toribami, Ren Konatsu, Shino Suzuki & Toga (10:08)

Mahiro Kiryu & Miyu Yamashita defeat Maki Itoh & Pom Harajuku (8:19)

Arisu Endo, HIMAWARI, Rika Tatsumi & Yuki Kamifuku defeat Kyoraku Kyomei (Hyper Misao & Shoko Nakajima), Haru Kazashiro & Yuki Arai (12:41)

Tokyo Princess Cup 2025 First Round:
Wakana Uehara defeats Suzume (9:24)

Tokyo Princess Cup 2025 First Round:
Miu Watanabe defeats Raku (12:49)

Tokyo Princess Cup 2025 First Round:
Mizuki defeats Yuki Aino (13:45)

TJPW News & Upcoming Shows

On 2nd August in Hamamatsu, Shizuoka, the next set of first round matches of the Princess Cup will take place. Shoko Nakajima will meet Rika Tatsumi in a blockbuster match; although, much like Miyu sidestepping Moka at the press conference, Shoko just said she wanted to face Mizuki as they are both singles champions (Shoko is a champion in MLW). HIMAWARI will face Haru Kazashiro. Kazashiro spoke about how it was her last summer as a high school student and that HIMAWARI was one of the few left of her TJPW 2023 class that she hadn’t beaten. Finally, Arisu Endo will take on Hyper Misao and Yuki Kamifuku faces Yuki Arai in a battle of the Yukis.

On 9th August, the quarter finals will take place in Shinagawa Grand Hall, Tokyo. The semi finals will be hosted at EDION Arena Osaka #2 on 17th August with the finals set for Korakuen Hall on 23rd August. The finals will only be TJPW’s 3rd Korakuen Hall show of 2025.

TJPW announced that Moka Miyamoto will be absent for the foreseeable future as she prioritises her health and will recover under her doctor’s guidance. TJPW will provide an update when she is ready to return to the ring.

Ivy Steele’s last match in TJPW will be on 9th August, as she is returning to the UK to continue studies after completing her one-year abroad in Japan.

The 2nd season of the “Next Gen” documentary will start being released in August.

© DDT Pro Wrestling

DDT

The Fighting Beer Garden 2025 in Shinjuku – 2 Days

15th July 2025 & 16th July 2025
Shinjuku FACE, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe

DDT packed out Shinjuku FACE for a double header on the 15th and 16th of July. The Shinjuku crowd is always hot, but they were noticeably a notch louder for these two shows. All in all, let’s just say that this show didn’t do much to convince the puroresu lovers to watch DDT. It was more on the “silly” side, although Sato and Higuchi were able to escape that on both nights and had great matches. The most newsworthy development was that Yuki Ueno will be challenging for the KO-D Openweight Championship on 31st August, Night 2 of “Peter Pan”, at Korakuen Hall.

The main event of the 15th July was Danshoku Dino vs. KANON. At the start of the show, they bowed to each other and accidentally bumped heads, selling it before running to the back. At the end of the show, it was clear they had swapped bodies, taking inspiration from Hyper Misao and Yuki Aino on TJPW’s “HYPE! 3” show. Dino came out to KANON’s entrance and mimicking KANON’s mannerisms. The crowd was very excited to see what KANON would do with Dino’s gimmick. That’s actually an understatement, they absolutely loved this segment. To be fair to KANON, he totally committed to it, providing full on kisses to willing audience members. On 8th July, Dino had really taken advantage of KANON at Ueno Park, so Dino played up that aspect of KANON’s unwillingness. They were both great in their roles and put on a fun main event.

© DDT Pro Wrestling

The first night also had a DDT Extreme Championship match between champion To-y and challenger Hikaru Sato, who was selected via a poll on Twitter. The match began 24 hours before the show. The rules were “Falls Count Anywhere,” and the first to win via pinfall or submission won the title. If the match ended before the show on the 15th started, only the winner’s announcement would take place during the show. Both wrestlers were given ¥10,000 (10k yen) in funds, which they could use to buy weapons, hire allies, or otherwise gain an advantage. Funds could also be gambled to increase the amount. Both tweeted in the 24-hour period before the show about the state of their funds. To-y came into the show with 120k yen, although he needed Sato to lend him some money in Ueno Park days earlier.

To-y and Sato both stumbled in after the intermission. Sato had used his funds to hire 3 of the biggest dudes he could find, including Ryoma Tsukamoto, to beat To-y up because he couldn’t pay back the loan. He convinced the big dudes to play a game of keeping up the shuttlecock with Hello Kitty rackets. Sato batted the shuttlecock into Toy’s shuttle… yeah. They then started to undress To-y, struggling greatly with his boots. To-y’s muscled hire, Yuya Koroku, launched himself onto Sato and Tsukamoto with a tope suicida. To-y took care of the other two with his smelly socks. Sato funneled the power of Minoru Suzuki by wearing his t-shirt. To-y stole it and put it on, leading Sato and his thugs to think that To-y was Suzuki and so they all promptly bowed down in respect. Every time To-y would chop or hit Sato, Sato would bow down after, as he would not dare fight back against Suzuki. This allowed Suzuki – I mean, To-y – to get the pinfall. After the match, To-y couldn’t pay Koroku back so he offered him a title shot, which Koroku accepted. The Extreme Title match would be a change of pace for Koroku as he’s been going hard with quality in-ring work. That match is set for 30th August, Night 1 of “Peter Pan”.

© DDT Pro Wrestling

Chris Brookes, Kazusada Higuchi & Yuki Ueno took on Daichi Sato, Kazuma Sumi & Yuni. This match was a team of KO-D Openweight Champions (current and former) against the three youngest members of the DDT roster, as Daichi and Yuni are 16 and Sumi is 22. This match ruled. The kids got bullied mercilessly, to the soundtrack of screams from the crowd, with Daichi the only saving hope of his team. He went toe-to-toe with Ueno and Brookes. DDT is really trying to shine a light on Sato in the last few months. Later, Sumi and Daichi teamed together to kick the crap out of the champion Higuchi so he would let go of a brutal Liontamer on Yuni. Yuni tried to rally against Higuchi, but three powerful body slams in a row sealed the deal. Higuchi told Yuni that he has to pass his exams since he’s stepping away from something he loves (wrestling).

Kazuki Hirata, MAO and Takeshi Masada had to contend with Antonio Honda’s rock alter-ego, A. YAZAWA, in a “Rock ‘n’ Roll” deathmatch. For those unaware, they have to start dancing any time music plays, no matter what they’re doing. Sometimes they play some love-making music which gets the wrestlers all hot and bothered.* I don’t need to do my “how does DDT attract a strong female demo” rant again. Consider that sentence my rant. And KANON in the main event. One of the songs was kickstarted by MAO and Kimihiro, and they all took turns singing a verse. It came to Masada, and the music switched off and you could just hear Masada’s out-of-tune voice. Masada looked totally embarrassed. He is just great at the wrestling, and the comedy. A true star in the making.

*(Editor’s Note: I have GOT to start watching this promotion.)

© DDT Pro Wrestling

DAMNATION T.A. came out for their match, but Daisuke Sasaki looked suspiciously different. He looked quite bald, and his chops looked very weak. It turns out that it wasn’t Sasaki – he had swapped places with camera guy Mataro Suzuki, who frequently gets dragged into DAMNATION T.A. matches. Yuki Iino found Daisuke operating the camera and brought him into the ring. Iino wanted to drop the elbow on Sasaki but Mataro came into the ring and saved Sasaki. Mataro then proceeded to get stiffly chopped by Yukio Naya, before getting smacked in the head with Daisuke’s slipper. Mataro later executed Iino’s Burning Elbow on him before locking in a choke, sending the crowd crazy. Iino returned the favour to pick up the win. Ilusion had some McDonald’s chips that he tried to hammer into Akito’s skull. After the match, Mataro retired, once again, to a 10 bell toll.

Yuya Koroku has wrestled with a bit of an attitude since his win in the D Generations Cup and subsequent title match loss to Chris Brookes. In 2025, he is probably the best he has ever looked inside the ring. Ishida was very over with the crowd and I enjoyed his work in this match, at one point clapping in Koroku’s face to distract him before suplexing him. Koroku won with the Triangle Lancer in a solid opener.

© DDT Pro Wrestling

Night 2 was just as enjoyable as night 1. Ryoma Tsukamoto, a JTO wrestler who has mostly appeared on the DDT “D Generations” shows, got a taste of what it was like to be in the ring with Aoki. He teamed up with Higuchi and Iino to take on Sato, Aoki and Sumi. When Sato was kicking Iino in the chest repeatedly, Higuchi was looking on like an absolute sicko, enjoying every second. That was awesome. This whole match was really good, I loved it, especially the creative finish of Higuchi catching Sumi mid-air and slowly lowering him to the ground into a pin as Sumi struggled for his life. If Akiyama gets more than a couple of minutes at the start of the tag team fight on 27th July, that would be a shame – the match should be used to elevate Sato against Iino and Naya.

There was an eight-man tag where each wrestler was impersonating another. The teams, with who they were impersonating in brackets, were Antonio Honda (Ishida), Kazuki Hirata (Ueno), Yuki Ueno (Honda) & Yuya Koroku (MAO) against MAO (Masada), Takeshi Masada (Koroku), To-y (Hirata) & Yuki Ishida (To-y). Ueno did the Honda gimmick of falling over and told a story. Honda still managed to fall over himself even while being Ishida, so maybe his leg injury is real. Masada had a great Koroku impression, as he moved exactly like him with his chest sticking out a bit. I appreciated the subtlety in Masada’s performance – have I said how good Masada is both at wrestling and comedy? This match was really fun and showed off the charisma chops of the current roster.

© DDT Pro Wrestling

I love “King of Drunk” matches. DDT wrestlers are either experts at acting drunk, or actually getting blackout drunk. In particular, a drunk Daisuke Sasaki is probably my favourite thing in DDT. He’s honestly incredible. 5* performance. The other two participants in the drunken shenanigans were Chris Brookes and HARASHIMA. The gimmick is that they take shots at regular intervals and get more pissed as the fight goes on. Sasaki tried a cartwheel while drunk and fell on his ass. Brookes tried a diving senton on HARASHIMA and completely missed. It was chaos. Sasaki put up the “X” after going for two airplane spins. He was done. He returned 10 minutes later dressed as a referee blowing a whistle. I don’t know why. He was drunk out of his mind. He then kept drinking. HARASHIMA still had precision perfect kicks while drunk. Awesome stuff.

This continued into the Battle Royal to determine the contender for the KO-D Openweight Championship on 31st August at “Peter Pan”. Sasaki climbed onto the backs of wrestlers, blowing his whistle and trying to surf them. Brookes eliminated himself as he had to go and pee. HARASHIMA seemed to get stronger and better the more he drank. He skinned the cat like five times in a row until he was finally eliminated. Sasaki tried to skin the cat himself but gave up and eliminated himself. The 3 in the Battle Royal were KANON, Masada and Ueno. KANON gave Masada a lariat to knock him off the apron. Ueno allowed KANON to get back into the ring to settle it mano-a-mano. Ueno pinned KANON with the WR fair and square. It turned out Hirata was not eliminated and he ran in trying to roll-up, but got caught out, immediately tapped to a headlock and sprinted to the back. Ueno will challenge Higuchi on 31st August for the KO-D Openweight Championship.

Full Results Day 1

Yuya Koroku defeats Yuki Ishida (9:51)

The Apex (Yuki Iino & Yukio Naya), Akito & HARASHIMA defeat DAMNATION T.A (Daisuke Sasaki, Hideki Okatani, Ilusion & MJ Paul) (12:20)

Rock ‘n’ Roll Four Way Death Match:
MAO defeats A. YAZAWA and Kazuki Hirata and Takeshi Masada (15:30)

Chris Brookes, Kazusada Higuchi & Yuki Ueno defeat Daichi Sato, Kazuma Sumi & Yuni (14:16)

DDT Extreme Title Pro Wrestling Excursion Death Match:
To-y (c) defeats Hikaru Sato (1543:21)

Danshoku Dino defeats KANON (11:55)

Full Results Day 2

Jun Akiyama & Tomomitsu Matsunaga defeat DAMNATION T.A (Hideki Okatani & Ilusion) (6:55)

Kazusada Higuchi, Ryoma Tsukamoto & Yuki Iino defeat Daichi Sato, Kazuma Sumi & Shinya Aoki (8:19)

Ghost Story New Numabukuro Death Match: Danshoku Dino defeats Akito and KANON and Soma Takao (11:47)

Antonio Honda, Kazuki Hirata, Yuki Ueno & Yuya Koroku defeat MAO, Takeshi Masada, To-y & Yuki Ishida (15:22)

King Of Drunk Title:
Chris Brookes vs. Daisuke Sasaki vs. HARASHIMA – Draw (21:45)

KO-D Openweight Title #1 Contendership Battle Royal:
Yuki Ueno defeats Akito and Antonio Honda and Daichi Sata and Daisuke Sasaki and HARASHIMA and Hideki Okatani and Ilusion and KANON and Kazuki Hirata and Kazuma Sumi and MJ Paul and Shinya Aoki and Soma Takao and Takeshi Masada and To-y and Tomomitsu Matsunaga and Yuki Iino and Yuki Ishida and Yuya Koroku (14:04)

© DDT Pro Wrestling

HARASHIMA’s Triumphant Return!

27th July 2025
Ome, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe

DDT held a rare show in HARASHIMA’s hometown of Ome. In fact, according to Cagematch, the last two shows held in Ome were both by All Japan, in 1976 and 2004. HARASHIMA said it was his first time ever wrestling in Ome, that he had wanted to put on a show there for 10 years, and that they finally found enough sponsors, such as confectionery manufacturer Sanko Seisha, to make it possible. The mayor of Ome City, Toshiaki Ohsemachi, mentioned that he is one year younger than HARASHIMA and that it was a miracle to have wrestling back in Ome. Ome is in the same prefecture as Tokyo City but over a 1 hour drive away, so if a promotion is running in the prefecture, they’d pick one of the many venues in the city. It’s interesting that All Japan ran there at all.

HARASHIMA teamed up with Togi Makabe & Yasu Urano to take on Akito, Shinya Aoki & Shuji Ishikawa. Togi Makabe is HARASHIMA’s senpai and both went to Teikyo University’s Pro Wrestling Club. Yasu Urano cut his teeth with HARASHIMA in student pro wrestling events and were both part of the Smile Squash stable in DDT in the 2010s.

HARASHIMA should get more recognition for being such a high-level performer who still moves very well at the age of 51. He is coming off a KO-D Openweight Championship challenge in a very good match against Kazusada Higuchi. The only other wrestlers in the world around his age that are just as good are Masaaki Mochizuki in Dragongate and Tomohiro Ishii in New Japan. This was a fun main event, but nothing you need to go out of your way to see. HARASHIMA pinned Akito with a Somato from the top rope.

© DDT Pro Wrestling

The Apex (Yuki Iino & Yukio Naya) defended the KO-D Tag Team Championships against Daichi Sato & Jun Akiyama. The match started with Sato and Iino, as they have been clashing non-stop in preview tags, even ignoring other participants to just hit each other. The Apex took turns dismantling Sato while Akiyama looked on. It got too much for him as he jumped in to launch Naya with an exploder suplex. The action was more even from there on out. This was a good match that suffered from being in Ome rather than Shinjuku FACE or Korakuen Hall, but at least Sato was given a lot of time. DAMNATION T.A. (Daisuke Sasaki & Hideki Okatani) came out afterwards, challenging for the titles on night 1 of “Peter Pan”, 30th August.

Schadenfreude International (Chris Brookes & Takeshi Masada) took on 37KAMIINA (To-y & Yuki Ueno). They brought a kid into the ring who did not want to do business and kicked at Masada and Brookes during their usual pose. Brookes and Masada sold the lethal kicks well. In this match they basically brought the Ueno Park style to Ome with a chaotic falls count anywhere brawl. Ueno broke Bunbun’s back, leading into Toy using a set of stairs to do a diving crossbody onto Masada through a table for the win.

Strange Love Connection (KANON & MAO) clashed with Harimao (Kazusada Higuchi & Yuki Ishida). KANON reignited his romantic relationship with Higuchi from the King of DDT Finals by utilising their love language – trading chops. This was a good, hard hitting match, with Ishida in particular getting a good shine. MAO pinned Ishida with a Gedo clutch variation.

The mayor of Ome was at ringside and GM Hisaya Imabayashi wanted to make sure Dino wasn’t up to any shenanigans so they could return to Ome next year. Of course, there were shenanigans, and Hirata could not contain Dino. Dino picked up the win and while leaving the room, showed the mayor his bare rear and then kissed him.

In the opener, Kazuma Sumi pinned Ilusion in a singles match for the first time, making their singles record 2-1 to Ilusion.

Full Results

Kazuma Sumi defeats Ilusion (5:41)
Naomi Yoshimura & Soma Takao defeat Makoto Oishi & Shinichiro Kawamatsu (6:27)

Danshoku Dino defeats Kazuki Hirata (8:12)
DAMNATION T.A (Daisuke Sasaki, Hideki Okatani & MJ Paul) defeat Antonio Honda, Tomomitsu Matsunaga & Yuya Koroku (10:51)

Strange Love Connection (KANON & MAO) defeat Harimao (Kazusada Higuchi & Yuki Ishida (10:25)

Falls Count Anywhere Tag Team:
The 37KAMIINA (To-y & Yuki Ueno) defeat Schadenfreude International (Chris Brookes & Takeshi Masada) (15:50)

KO-D Tag Team Title:
The Apex (Yuki Iino & Yukio Naya) (c) defeat Daichi Sato & Jun Akiyama (19:27)

HARASHIMA, Togi Makabe & Yasu Urano defeat Akito, Shinya Aoki & Shuji Ishikawa (17:41)

© DDT Pro Wrestling

DDT House Show Notes

On 6th July, Pokotan made another DDT appearance teaming with Danshoku Dino to take on Antonio Honda and Kazuki Hirata. There were crowd members with their hand fans at ringside, so I can’t imagine what Pokotan’s ‘insides’ were going through. Pokotan took off his head to whack Honda with it for the win. I thought this match would be a bit crazier than it ended up being. Sato pinned Matsunaga when he teamed up with Ganbare Pro’s Munetatsu Nakamura (who looks good in every outing). Sato is definitely picking up some momentum, not sure whether it’s just for the KO-D Tag Team challenge with Akiyama, or more… During Daisuke Sasaki’s match when he was brawling in the crowd, they brawled near a kid who would burst into tears every time Sasaki looked at her. It was the highlight of the show. KANON beat Koroku in singles action, in a pretty good match, continuing his push. Chris Brookes and Takeshi Masada clashed with Kazusada Higuchi and Yuki Iino in a great main event, exactly what you’d expect from all four.

On 8th July, DDT returned to Ueno Park for more shenanigans. Original NWA Jr. member Makoto Oishi filled in for the injured Shunma Katsumata, doing the song and “Katsumata Ganbare” chants. They beat up Hirata while doing their song during Hirata’s match with Yuni. The beefy champions of DDT, Higuchi and the Apex (Iino & Naya) took on a future beefy DDT champion, Sato, as well as Akiyama and Soma Takao. It was really fun seeing Sato take on these guys. As you can see from our show recaps above, Sato has been booked a lot against these three. It started on this show. They meant business and roughed him up in a good match. If you like the silly deathmatches, DAMNATION T.A. took on Schadenfreude International in a Falls Count Anywhere Crocodile Deathmatch. Sasaki was the first to be eaten alive by the flesh-eating crocodiles. In the main event, Dino took full advantage of KANON. I think KANON is currently his favourite target. KANON or Mason Madden. KANON was really upset and cried in the corner.

© DDT Pro Wrestling

On 19th July, Hirata forced Bunbun into Dino’s backside. Later, Bunbun returned to have a rap battle with Kimihiro. Also on that show, Akiyama and Sato continued to build to their tag team match against the Apex as they took on Iino and Takao. The best thing about his feud has been Sato and Iino going at each other at any opportunity. Sato would just jump out of the ring on a whim to start beating up Iino. That was no different here. I love Iino getting challenged by a 16-year-old beefy boy. I think it’s worth noting Sato is like the most pushed 16-year-old in the world, in a major promotion, and no one bats an eye at it. That’s how good he is.

On 20th July, DDT hosted another one of their “Falls Count Anywhere” matches in public, this time at Tokyo Big Sight, a convention center. For the uninitiated, it’s just a bunch of the wrestlers having fun beating each other up with random things they find as the public follow them around, like To-y trying to put Ishida head first into a bin. This was Daichi Sato’s first taste of such a match, earning his comedy stripes, as is necessary on the DDT roster. He rode face first on the DDT bike straight into a stack of chairs, which looked like it hurt. At least he committed to the bit. Kazuma Sumi ran over Sanshiro Takagi with a bike and pinned him to become the new DDT Iron Man Heavy Metal Champion.

© DDT Pro Wrestling

DDT News & Upcoming Shows

Yuni suffered a broken rib on the 15th July show at Shinjuku FACE. Yuni was already scheduled to take a break to focus on his university exams, so his time out started a bit earlier due to the injury. Yuni announced he will be out for 4 months.

Daichi Sato gave an interview to Weekly Pro Magazine Weekly (Shupro) and said that one of his goals is to win the KO-D Openweight Championship while still in high school.

A lot of DDT talent were a part of the Shinjuku FACE 20th anniversary match, which is available for streaming on Wrestle Universe. The main event was Chris Brookes & Hiromu Takahashi versus All Japan’s Atsuki Aoyagi and Yuki Ueno. Our review of that show can be found at the end of the Japanese Independents section.

Hideki “Shrek” Sekine is coming in for a match on 2nd August, teaming up with Kazuki Hirata against Antonio Honda and Yuki Iino, which should be a fun match. Sekine recently faced Hirata at Syuri Namba’s produce show at TJPW on 14th June.

On 9th August, DAMNATION T.A. (Daisuke Sasaki, Hideki Okatani & Ilusion) defend their KO-D Six Man Tag Team Titles against Kazuma Sumi and The Apex (Yuki Iino & Yukio Naya). Also on the show, Danshoku Dino, Kazuki Hirata and Super Sasadango Machine fight for a “Right to Challenge Anytime, Anywhere” contract, and “D Generations” members Daichi Sato and Takeshi Masada find themselves in marquee singles matches against HARASHIMA and Shinya Aoki, respectively.

Gorgeous Matsuno returns for a match on 10th August, as he and Hirata face Akito and Danshoku Dino.

Mac Matsushita, who made his professional wrestling debut in Mexico and has performed under ring names such as Maku Donaruto, has signed an exclusive contract with Takagi’s Super Japan Pro Wrestling. Super Japan will hold its first event at Ueno Park on 19th August, and Matsushita will be on the card. His gimmick was quite controversial and could be summed up as “Dino’s gimmick but gone very wrong.” Supposedly, he will not be wrestling under his previous gimmick anymore so it will be a new start for him. He will be facing Naruki Doi, making his first DDT appearance of 2025. Also on that card are the Brahman Brothers & Yuji Nagata vs. Munenori Sawa & the Astronauts (which sounds awesome), DDT co-founder MIKAMI vs. TAKA Michinoku, and Mikiya Sasaki vs. Yasu Urano.

One of DDT’s biggest shows of the year is set for a two night extravaganza. On the first night on 30th August at Higashin Arena, so far we have:

The second night on 31st August at Korakuen Hall has the following matches, as of writing:

We’ll have a full preview in the issue before “Peter Pan”, but here are initial thoughts. There’s not much to write about in regards to the undercard, it will be your typical DDT Korakuen Hall style undercard that will feel like a breeze with some fun. The Schadenfreude International/TMDK tag on 30th August should be excellent if you’re parachuting in. This is Jun Akiyama’s first KO-D Openweight challenge since losing to Konosuke Takeshita in August 2021, I am not expecting fireworks but it will be a nice moment. Higuchi, after beating HARASHIMA, is getting the stamp of approval from as many legends as possible. I expect him to beat Ueno, too, after Ueno just had a lengthy run with the title in 2024. The card in general has a good balance between high work-rate and silly matches for a big show where they want to draw, so there’s no match that sticks out like a sore thumb. People doubt Dino on these big shows but he consistently has creative, fun matches, with his match against Sanshiro Takagi last year at “Peter Pan” being one of my favourites. I’m expecting him to have something up his sleeve for Tanahashi. If I’m honest, the match I’m looking forward to the most is the D Generations match, that is currently the best part of the DDT product which focuses on the younger talent, and they work super hard on those shows. Adding the returning Rukiya and the debuting Hinata to that series is very exciting.

© All Japan Pro Wrestling / Tokyo Sports

All Japan Pro Wrestling

Summer Action Series 2025

17th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 855
Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: ajpw.tv

All Japan kicked off their All Japan Jr. Festival 2025 tournament – their version of Best of the Super Juniors – on 17th July in Korakuen Hall. The attendance (855) was quite poor compared to their recent Korakuen shows, which are also scheduled for weekday mornings. The card was uninspiring; and as we know, it is quite difficult for the juniors to draw, but the strength elsewhere on the card was still below the standard of a Korakuen Hall show. While I thought some matches were good, such as the opener and the main event, this show was a bit of a struggle for me. It felt empty. The action felt cold, unexciting and it was another Korakuen show of ‘house show’ quality. I wrote in a previous All Japan column about the state of All Japan, and this show mostly encapsulated that. Good, but never great.

The show opened up with Fuminori Abe versus Dan Tamura in a good match. Despite being one of the best junior heavyweights around (and one who can mix it up and have great matches with the heavyweights), Abe is normally on the undercards in All Japan. This tournament is a good spotlight for someone like him. Abe and Tamura hit each other hard and battered each other with two stiff headbutts, before Tamura picked up the win. In the second match, Hikaru Sato tapped out Ryo Inoue quickly in a sprint of a match. Inoue headbutted a ringpost on the way out, clearly upset with the loss.

There was a Takashi six-man tag. If you want a status check on him to know if it’s safe to watch yet – he’s still really over. He’s not going anywhere. Ryuki Honda and Jun Saito met in a preview tag where they brawled a lot. After the match, Shotaro Ashino announced a new member of Team HAVOC via a video from XYON. Their new member is former WWE wrestler Odyssey Jones. Jones was released by WWE in September 2024 amidst domestic violence allegations levied by his former partner. The latest development in that case was Jones filing a defamation lawsuit against his former partner, with no criminal charges or arrests taking place. In January, he posted a video on Instagram stating that they were false allegations. Classic All Japan to pick up someone that even WWE are willing to drop. On the wrestling side, he’s quite average, so he fits in great in current-day All Japan.

The World Tag Team Championships were successfully defended by Business Tag Team (Kento Miyahara & Yuma Aoyagi) against Hokuto-gun (Hokuto Omori & Talos). Before the match, they unveiled the new tag team belts which looked good. Hokuto-gun brought out all of Yuma’s worst tendencies. It was not a good match for 95% of its duration. I liked the last few minutes; Hokuto and Yuma finally kicked into top gear, following on from their Champions Carnival match. Hokuto hit some great looking dragon suplexes and forearms on Yuma. There were some super close nearfalls that had the crowd living and dying with every count. Ultimately, Yuma managed to pin Hokuto. I think the worst part is that Yuma’s comedy is now becoming a storyline. Hideki Suzuki came out after the match to challenge for the titles with Kengo Mashimo on 3rd August. He told Yuma that he wanted the serious Yuma. We all do, Hideki, we all do.

The semi-main event was Atsuki Aoyagi versus Naruki Doi. This match did not pull me in much, despite the crowd being into it and getting behind Atsuki. I thought it was good, but nothing more. I do really like Atsuki’s Fisherman’s Busters, they are beautiful. Atsuki stole the match when he caught Doi in a pin as he was going for his Bakatare sliding kick.

In the main event, the defending champion, Seiki Yoshioka took on Rising HAYATO in Block A action. HAYATO recently left ELPIDA when it disbanded. In the press conference before the tournament, he spoke about how locked away the division had been and his intention to restore it. He and his former teammates (such as Yuma Anzai) have been talking about how this tournament should be a coming out party for him in this junior heavyweight division.This match was much better paced than Yoshioka’s recent big matches. While holding onto HAYATO in a Styles Clash, HAYATO flipped Yoshioka forward, spiking him onto his head. That looked sick and came out of nowhere. It was a great spot that elevated the match. Following that, HAYATO landed the Lionsault for the win over the champion. That will set HAYATO for a title shot at some point if he doesn’t win the tournament.

Full Results

All Japan Junior Festival 2025 Block B:
Dan Tamura [2] defeats Fuminori Abe [0] (10:11)

All Japan Junior Festival 2025 Block A:
Hikaru Sato [2] defeats Ryo Inoue [0] (2:18)

Baka No Jidai (Hideki Suzuki & Seigo Tachibana) & Kengo Mashimo defeat Hokuto-gun (Kuma Arashi & Takashi) & Shota Kofuji (7:10)

Davey Boy Smith Jr., Ren Ayabe, Ryuki Honda & Shotaro Ashino defeat Saito Brothers (Jun Saito & Rei Saito), MUSASHI & Yuko Miyamoto (11:24)

AJPW World Tag Team Title:
Business Tag Team (Kento Miyahara & Yuma Aoyagi) (c) defeat Hokuto-gun (Hokuto Omori & Talos) (17:15)

All Japan Junior Festival 2025 Block B:
Atsuki Aoyagi [2] defeats Naruki Doi [0] (17:44)

All Japan Junior Festival 2025 Block A:
Rising HAYATO [2] defeats Seiki Yoshioka [0] (16:02)

© All Japan Pro Wrestling / Tokyo Sports

Summer Action Series 2025

21st July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 795
EDION Arena #2, Osaka, Japan
Watch On: ajpw.tv

On 21st July, All Japan wrote another chapter in their Triple Crown Title scene as Jun Saito successfully defended against Ryuki Honda and Yuma Aoyagi beat Davey Boy Smith Jr. for the #1 Contendership for the Triple Crown. All Japan’s attendance for this show was 795. It is less than NOAH’s 929 at the same arena over a month before, but that was a great number for NOAH, so All Japan can’t be too unhappy with 795.

Jun’s sixth successful title defence against Ryuki perfectly captured my feeling of All Japan right now. I felt it was a bit slow and uninspiring. None of the action was bad, but I did find myself bored watching it, especially when comparing it to Jun’s match with Hideki Suzuki. I have seen what Ryuki can do in big spots and he was my MVP of the Champions Carnival, putting on excellent matches with, for example, Yuma Anzai. I am now ready to accept that Jun simply cannot lead a main event match that I enjoy. Both combatants hit each other hard, but it still did not spark much excitement from the crowd, nor myself. Ryuki tried to get things going with a German suplex on the apron to no avail. Ryuki then followed up by attempting to knock Jun out with elbows, but it didn’t get quite the reaction Jun’s attempted knockout on Hideki received. The one spot that did get the crowd going was Ryuki kicking out of Jun’s Dying Light. Nevertheless, Jun picked up the win with Days Gone. A good match, but nothing more than that for me. I am quite ready for a new champion at the top.

Yuma beat Davey Boy Smith Jr. in a Davey Boy Smith Jr. match which has a cap of “that was okay.” Yuma, who has been playing up the comedy in recent months, seemed a bit more switched on in his fight with DBS. The title match will be in his hometown so we can hope that he may want to go all out.

Away from the Triple Crown scene that I feel a bit bummed out on, let’s talk about the positives. There were some really good All Japan Jr. Festival matches. The first standout match for me was Dan Tamura beating MUSASHI in Block B action. This match was brutal, and it was all about putting Dan over as a monster, and I think they more than succeeded. It was quite a slow match and not much happened in the first several minutes, but for me it really worked because the crescendo was violent and abrupt. The crowd did not care about this match as much as I did. The last few minutes saw Dan drop MUSASHI with a nasty lariat several times, before clubbing him from both the front and the back with lariats. He finally decapitated MUSASHI for the win. The second great match was Ryo Inoue and Seigo Tachibana, surprisingly. Inoue is the real deal, he is a very good worker, and Tachibana had his working boots on for this match. He beat Inoue with a running elbow to the back of the head. Rising HAYATO beat Hikaru Sato with the springboard moonsault in a good match. This match was all about chopping each other, I liked the change of pace from HAYATO’s other matches. Naruki Doi beat Fuminori Abe with a sit-out roll-up in a fun, short striking battle.

Full Results

All Japan Jr. Festival 2025 Block B:
Naruki Doi [4] defeats Fuminori Abe [0] (9:09)

All Japan Jr. Festival 2025 Block A:
Seigo Tachibana [2] defeats Ryo Inoue [2] (10:00)

Atsuki Aoyagi, Hideki Suzuki & Seiki Yoshioka defeat Aran Sano, Rei Saito & Yasufumi Nakanoue (8:37)

Triple Crown #1 Contendership:
Yuma Aoyagi defeats Davey Boy Smith Jr. (9:38)

Hokuto-gun (Hokuto Omori, Kuma Arashi, Takashi & Talos) defeat Kento Miyahara, Ren Ayabe, Shota Kofuji & Shotaro Ashino (17:22)

Zennichi Junior Festival 2025 Block A:
Rising HAYATO [4] defeats Hikaru Sato [2] (11:27)

Zennichi Junior Festival 2025 Block B:
Dan Tamura [4] defeats MUSASHI [2] (12:28)

Triple Crown Title:
Jun Saito (c) defeats Ryuki Honda (22:39)

© All Japan Pro Wrestling / Tokyo Sports

AJPW House Show Notes

On 20th July, All Japan held a show at Wohlfahrt in Toyama. We started off with BOSJ-style parity booking – as after the show, there was a four-way tie in both blocks. Yoshioka beat Tachibana with La Magistral and Inoue beat HAYATO with the Daikannon suplex hold in Block A. Inoue and HAYATO were fast paced and the match was quite good. In Block B Doi beat Tamura with the V9 Clutch and MUSASHI beat Atsuki with Niten Ichiryu. HAYATO and Atsuki are favourites so I guess the idea is to beat them on the smaller shows. Hokuto-gun retained the titles in a comedy match against the local Toyama Black Ramen Men.

All Japan hosted two nights at Shin-Kiba 1st RING on 24th and 26th July to wrap up the “All Japan Jr. Festival”, with a hot crowd on both nights. On 24th July in Block A, Tachibana beat Sato by reversing a cross armbreaker into a pin, and Yoshioka beat Inoue with Crush Driver to eliminate Inoue. The Sato/Tachibana match was better than I expected it to be, which is Tachibana’s second time impressing me this tournament. Tachibana’s loud, crisp striking has allowed him to stand out. There was still a lot of his crouch taunt, but they played into it by Sato kicking him every time he did it, until later he stepped on Sato’s foot and taunted. The crowd popped for the finish. Yoshioka and Inoue’s match was solid, centered around them wanting to kick a hole in each other’s chest. In Block B, Atsuki beat Abe with a roll-up and MUSASHI beat Doi with Niten Ichiryu. The story of Atsuki/Abe was Abe being relentless going after Atsuki’s leg with around 15 minutes of working it, with strikes and holds, only to get rolled up. If you’re into limb work and the crowd getting behind Atsuki, you’ll like the match a lot. I liked it as it was nice seeing Abe control a match so well. The crowd was peaking the mics in the super hot MUSASHI/Doi main event. I just thought it was good, but the crowd added a notch.

© All Japan Pro Wrestling / Tokyo Sports

So going into the final day on 26th July, All Japan took a page from Gedo’s book with a 3 way tie in Block A and a 4 way tie in Block B. This Shin-Kiba crowd was once again incredibly loud as the champion Yoshioka lost to Sato in a match centered around Sato working Yoshioka’s left arm. That surely sets up a title match for Sato in the future. The result meant that whoever won between HAYATO and Tachibana would go through to the final. The crowd rallied behind HAYATO. Tachibana’s elbow strike sounded like he had knocked the opponent out. Once again Tachibana came out with a point to prove and put on a good match, playing the bully perfectly. HAYATO tapped Tachibana out to advance. This was my match of the tournament, followed by Tamura/MUSASHI on 21st July. In fact, it’s in my top 3 matches of the year in All Japan and might be my AJPW MOTY, but I am lower on Jun’s matches and I love crisp striking. In Block B, Abe picked up his “you’re not a total loser with 0 pts” win, beating MUSASHI. Atsuki pinned Tamura with a moonsault to advance to the finals.

Sure enough, as I wrote above – Atsuki Aoyagi and Rising HAYATO, the two favourites, made it through to the final. The Shin-Kiba shows were really good, made by a super hot crowd. It’s worth checking out the matches if you have any investment in the juniors, especially HAYATO vs. Tachibana.

© All Japan Pro Wrestling / Tokyo Sports

AJPW News & Upcoming Shows

All Japan announced that the 12th Royal Road tournament would be returning, starting on 24th August at Korakuen Hall, all the way through to 15th September at Korakuen Hall. There will be 16 participants, with the first-round matchups already announced:

It’s Kengo Mashimo’s second appearance, with his last appearance in 2018. Naoya Nomura makes his All Japan return after 2 years following injury. Ren Ayabe won in 2024, and Kento is a 2-time champion in 2018 and 2022.

On the 3rd August at Ota City General Gymnasium, the finals of the All Japan Jr. Festival will take place, with Atsuki Aoyagi vs. Rising HAYATO. At a press conference on 27th July, they promised this would be the best match of the tournament. HAYATO said they want to cure All Japan’s “heavyweight addiction.” He also commented that he feels they matched the heavyweights judging by the crowd heat, and that is certainly true in reference to Shin-Kiba. They both agree that the future of the division is on the line and they cannot afford to have a bad match. The full announced card is:

On 10th August, All Japan will host a show in Matsumoto, Nagano, at Air Water Arena Matsumoto, which can have a capacity of 3,600 to 7,000 depending on setup. In the main event, Jun Saito will defend the Triple Crown Title against Yuma Aoyagi in Yuma’s hometown.

Taishin Nagao, who was hit by a bus on 31st May, remains in an intensive care unit, as of an All Japan update posted on 22nd July. The news update mentions that Nagao experienced trauma related to “abdominal compression.” Since the middle of June, roster members and staff have been allowed to visit him with the hospital’s and his parents’ permission.

Final Standings of All Japan Jr. Festival 2025

© Dragongate

Dragongate

Buyuden Rei ~ Zero ~ Vol. 7

23rd July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 237
Shinjuku FACE, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: dragongate.live

The first live Dragongate show to be aired after “Kobe World” was the 7th installment of Masaaki Mochizuki’s produce show “Buyuden Rei” – which was a fun show, but not something that is necessary viewing if you’re just trying to keep up with Dragongate storylines, although there were some tidbits bleeding from the DG universe as Ryoya Tanaka successfully defended his Open The Brave Gate Title for the first time and subsequently called out Mochizuki for his next defence, and Strong Machine J went up against Z-Brats (ISHIN & Madoka Kikuta) in the main event with Koshinaka.

Kikuta and J were coming fresh off their No DQ match at “Kobe World” which Kikuta won by smashing a table on J’s face with a hip attack. Koshinaka was the first IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion and winner of the inaugural Best of the Super Juniors tournament. Kikuta could not hide his smile while wrestling Koshinaka to start the match. Of course, Koshinaka didn’t work a lot of this match, as he is 66. Kikuta tried to destroy Koshinaka with a hip attack on the outside, but Koshinaka dodged, hitting ISHIN instead, so Koshinaka delivered a hip attack to both. J pinned ISHIN with the Devil Windmill Suplex.

In the semi-main event, Jun Masaoka, primarily wrestling in deathmatch promotion FREEDOMS (while not doing deathmatches), challenged Ryoya Tanaka for his Open The Brave Gate Title in a very good match. If you like Tanaka, this match is worth checking out. After the 10 minute mark, there was a great spot where Masaoka spiked Tanaka’s head into the mat with a hurricanrana driver. There was a great (scary) nearfall when Masaoka almost picked up the win with a backslide. Tanaka pinned Masaoka with the Phoenix Splash. Tanaka called out Masaaki after the match, which Masaaki was surprised by and said he’d think about it.

Two representatives of the best in-ring unit in the industry right now, Love & Peace’s Mochizuki Jr. & Riiita, faced off against the comedy/shoot-style masters Fuminori Abe and Munenori Sawa. This was the first time Abe would face off against Junior and second against Riiita. As soon as Abe and Junior went at it, I thought, yeah, this is my shit. Just a really fun 10 minutes. No notes.

PARADOX (BxB Hulk, Susumu Yokosuka & YAMATO) tried, unsuccessfully, to take the AJPW Six Man Tag Team Championship from Hokuto-gun (Hokuto Omori, Kuma Arashi & Takashi). This match had no right being as fun as it was with a molten hot crowd. Takashi has figured out the formula for whipping up the crowd into a frenzy in the midcard.

The Ganbare Pro Wrestling duo of Mizuki Watase and Munetatsu Nakamura took on a duo from the Mochizuki Dojo, rookie Akiharo Sahara and Daiki Yanagiuchi. Nakamura impresses me each time I see him and is generally just a great young wrestler. He puts in good performances in DDT when he gets the chance to. This match was quite good, with Sahara and Daiki putting in a good babyface performance; Daiki in particular was popular. Watase won with a thunderous elbow on Daiki. Watase shoved his Spirit Of Ganbare World Tag Team Title in their face after the match, so we’ll see if that leads to anything. Mochizuki did appear in Ganbare on 19th July, so it’s possible.

In the opener, Mochizuki himself teamed up with Punch Tominaga to take on two of NOAH’s Team 2000X, Daga & Owadasan. Owadasan is due to go on an excursion in the coming months. Mochizuki slapping the crap out of Owadasan, who has been a menace in NOAH, was fun. 

Full Results

Daga & Owadasan defeat Masaaki Mochizuki & Tominagasan (Punch Tominaga) (10:01)

Mizuki Watase & Munetatsu Nakamura defeat Mochizuki Dojo (Akihiro Sahara & Daiki Yanagiuchi) (10:31)

Love And Peace (Mochizuki Jr. & Riiita) defeat Fuminori Abe & Ippanjin Munenori Sawa (10:06)

AJPW TV Six Man Tag Team Title: Hokuto-gun (Hokuto Omori, Kuma Arashi & Takashi) (c) defeat PARADOX (BxB Hulk, Susumu Yokosuka & YAMATO) (17:15)

Open The Brave Gate Title:
Ryoya Tanaka (c) defeats Jun Masaoka (13:22)

Shiro Koshinaka & Strong Machine J defeat Z-Brats (ISHIN & Madoka Kikuta) (14:45)

© bbm

27th July 2025
Kobe Sambo Hall, Kobe, Japan
Watch On: dragongate.live

Dragongate returned to Kobe for their first “canon” live show since “Kobe World”. This show continued the Z-Brats civil war after Madoka Kikuta turned on Shun Skywalker after the main event on 13th July. The rookie that Shun brought into Z-Brats, Homare, had carried Shun out of the building following the turn, making clear where his allegiances lay.

The main event was an all Z-Brats “Royal Sambo” (if indeed we can say Shun and Homare are a part of Z-Brats). Homare came out to the ring with a Shun-style entrance mask. Yoshiki Kato was the second entrant, and after he got into the ring he was posing as his name was announced, but immediately turned around and lariated Homare clean. Homare retaliated with his signature superkick before applying a head scissors takedown for the pin, eliminating Kato. Homare was outnumbered as ISHIN, Kai and the Open The Twin Gate Champions Jason Lee and Kota Minoura strolled out casually to beat Homare up. Shun came out of the crowd to help Homare out and immediately eliminate Jason Lee and KAI. Madoka Kikuta got into the ring, as they faced off for the first time in a match since “Kobe World”. They brawled in the crowd, with Kikuta dominant as Shun laughed in his face. Homare attempted to come to Shun’s aid but was punished and eliminated. Shun delivered a Blaster to Kikuta on the apron for a double elimination.

After the match, Shun said that he did not care about the Royal Sambo, and did not care about Kobe, an insignificant speck from the heavens. Instead, he came to the ring to teach Kikuta, the traitor, a lesson of what happens if you spit at the heavens. Kikuta said that he will pull Shun from the heavens and that his hell has already begun.

The Open The Triangle Gate Champions, Team Mexico (Bendito, Flamita & Luis Mante), took on Natural Vibes (Kzy, Strong Machine J & U-T) in a fun non-title match. U-T tried to tap Flamita out with Perfecto, but Flamita rolled him over, landed a couple of superkicks and lined him up for the Firebird Splash to take the win and prove why they are champions. Even though Natural Vibes lost, this could lead to a title match, as Flamita and Kzy were shoving each other while simultaneously acting friendly with each other in what were indeed not natural vibes.

© bbm

Mochizuki Dojo (Akihiro Sahara, Daiki Yanagiuchi & Masaaki Mochizuki) took on D’courage (Dragon Dia, Ryoya Tanaka & Yuki Yoshioka) as they continued building towards Tanaka defending his Open The Brave Gate Title against Mochizuki. This match was quite good with a very fun back-and-forth between Sahara and Yuki. The sequences between Mochi and Tanaka were also good as they slapped each other hard before Tanaka got the win with a roll-up. After the match, Tanaka asked Mochizuki if he had thought about the challenge he made on 23rd July. Mochizuki said that he was doubting but, since he was beaten, he can’t refuse the champion’s request. GM Ryo Saito made it official.

Love & Peace member Mochizuki Jr. lost in an upset to Ryu Fuda. While Fuda debuted before Junior, Junior is well pushed and normally quite high up the card, recently losing an Open The Brave Gate Title match to U-T at Korakuen Hall on 4th June. Fuda has mostly been a prelim guy. With both known for their strong kicks, they booted each other hard in this hard-hitting 7 minute match. Junior realised the power of Fuda’s kicks and worked over his left leg. Fuda caught a break when he landed a high kick with his right leg on Junior. As Fuda tried to escape an ankle loc, Junior modified it into a wheelbarrow German suplex which was great. Junior was in control of the match from that point onwards, until he was rolled up. Junior was incensed.

Full Results

Love & Peace (Ben-K, Hyo, JACKY KAMEI & Riiita) defeat Don Fujii, Shachihoko Boy, Takashi & Yasushi Kanda (8:56)

Ryu Fuda defeats Mochizuki Jr. (7:39)

PARADOX (BxB Hulk, Dragon Kid, Kagetora, Susumu Yokosuka & YAMATO) defeat Ho Ho Lun, Ho Lee, Mondai Ryu, Reach Tominaga & Yosuke Santa Maria (8:01)

D’courage (Dragon Dia, Ryoya Tanaka & Yuki Yoshioka) defeat Mochizuki Dojo (Akihiro Sahara, Daiki Yanagiuchi & Masaaki Mochizuki) (8:28)

Team Mexico (Flamita, Luis Mante & Bendito) defeat Natural Vibes (Kzy, Strong Machine J & U-T) (11:23)

Royal Sambo: Madoka Kikuta and Shun Skywalker defeat Homare and ISHIN and Jason Lee and KAI and Kota Minoura and Yoshiki Kato – Double Over-the-top-rope Elimination (14:59)

Dragongate News & Upcoming Shows

Dai Tsujiguchi will be making his debut in the upcoming weeks. He had an exhibition match with YAMATO on 21st July in Toyama. He will be featured on a local Toyama prefecture station “Tulip TV” on their flagship evening news program, “News 6”, covering Dai’s journey to the debut. Dai used to play rugby on the Toyama Daichii High School team.

The 15th installment of the “PRIME ZONE Plus+” show will be held on 29th August.

Seiji Miyane’s Dragongate-affiliated produce show “Gate of Miyane” is returning for a second instalment on 24th September at Korakuen Hall. Minoru Suzuki and DDT’s Danshoku Dino have been announced as the first participants. Seiji Miyane is a veteran Japanese TV anchor who currently hosts Yomiuri TV’s Information Live Miyaneya, anchors Fuji TV’s Mr. Sunday, and leads Fuji News Network’s (FNN) special election coverage.

The 5th August Korakuen Hall show will continue the build to “Dangerous Gate 2025” with an exciting main event, as Shun & Homare team up to take on ISHIN & Kikuta. There should be a few more matches set up for the Ota City show. The full card is:

Dragongate are running Ota City General Gymnasium on 17th August for “Dangerous Gate 2025”, headlined by Madoka Kikuta challenging Shun Skywalker for the Open The Dream Gate Title. Additionally, Ryoya Tanaka will defend his Open The Brave Gate Title against Masaaki Mochizuki.

© Marigold

Dream Star Fighting Marigold

Burning Spirit Series 2025

29th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 387
Shinjuku FACE, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe

Marigold, finally back in Tokyo after their Korakuen Hall show on 16th July, held a show at Shinjuku FACE in their final outing before the Dream Star Grand Prix. Mayu Iwatani successfully defended her Super Flyweight Title in the main event against Erina Yamanaka. The match was set up on the 16th July Korakuen Hall show. This match was much better than I thought it would be going in, but I guess that’s the power of Mayu in Marigold. To Erina’s credit, she tried hard and looked good in several spots this match, such as a great diving crossbody to the outside, a good spider suplex and fierce strikes. In a sweet moment, while in tears, Mayu paid tribute to her late father, who passed away on 27th July, and said that she sadly never got to show him her wrestling life as he battled an illness for 20 long years in a wheelchair.

In the semi-main event there was a Dream Star GP preview tag, with the Dream League team of Kouki Amarei, Seri Yamaoka, Utami Hayashishita and Victoria Yuzuk facing off against the Star League team of Chanyota, Mai Sakurai, Miku Aono and Kizuna Tanaka. I am not usually on safety watch, but Seri is 8 months into her career and doing some sick bumps on her spear. I am not sure why. This time, Tanaka landed on Seri’s head, and Seri tagged out immediately and was lying outside the ring for a while. She might have been fine, but it looked scary, and I’ve felt that way every time she does the spear. Seri has gone from a great debut with MIRAI focusing on her strongest skillset, grappling and suplexes, to having a period of time where she has shown how green she was working on other aspects of her game. However, over time, it is clear that she is improving, but she does not need to go as hard as she does. Compare it to Marvelous’ rookie Senka Akatsuki, who literally just has a lariat, body slam and vertical suplex in her arsenal, yet is very over in how she uses those moves and expresses herself. The reason I love her bouts with Senka is she looks fired up, and they tend to focus on what both are best at – intense brawling and grappling.

© Marigold

That aside, one Marigold wrestler who has been on fire in 2025 and has gone from being labeled a “super rookie” to just one of the better workers in the promotion, is Victoria Yuzuki. She looked good in this tag going up against Mai Sakurai and I’m excited for a lot of her Dream Star singles matches. Miku and Utami traded lariats and shoulder blocks in what is surely a preview of an eventual red belt match, given Miku has not yet challenged for it. Miku and Utami were awesome together, and it was the exact same chemistry that they had at Miku’s homecoming on 5th July. I am not going to get too excited because too often Utami has had excellent preview tags with an underwhelming title match after, but I do hope that they schedule it one day.

Chika Goto took on Minami Yuuki in a solid mid-card match. I am really warming up to Chika’s role in the midcard. She’s fun, entertaining and the crowd likes her. From promo transcripts I’ve seen, she’s quite funny and willing to be self-deprecating. She has her detractors, but if she is not pushed as someone who can hold the red belt, she is more than serviceable on the roster. Goto beat Yuuki with the GCS (chokeslam).

MIRAI teamed up with promising rookie Yuuka Yamazaki to face Darkness Revolution (Nagisa Nozaki & Rea Seto). Seto joined DR in the main event on 12th July (see our house show notes below for more details). Yamazaki tapped out to Seto’s reverse chicken wing hold.

Gigaton is back. For those who don’t know, it’s the gimmick that acts as Nao Ishikawa’s jail. She teamed up with Megaton to take on Darkness Revolution (CHIAKI & Misa Matsui). It was her first appearance as Gigaton since 11th May, and I had started to believe the coast was clear. Anyway, in this match she turned on Megaton. There will not be Gigaton or Megaton match reviews going forward, unless something notable happens.

Full Results

Komomo Minami defeats Hummingbird and Nagisa Tachibana (4:55)

CHIAKI & Misa Matsui defeat Nao Ishikawa & Megaton (11:48)

Nagisa Nozaki & Rea Seto defeat MIRAI & Yuuka Yamazaki (12:19)

Chika Goto defeats Minami Yuuki (9:42)

Chanyota, Mai Sakurai, Miku Aono & Kizuna Tanaka vs. Kouki Amarei, Seri Yamaoka, Utami Hayashishita & Victoria Yuzuki – Time Limit Draw (20:00)

Superfly Title:
Mayu Iwatani defeats Erina Yamanaka (13:15)

© Marigold

Marigold House Show Notes

On 12th July at Shin-Kiba 1st RING in Tokyo, Mayu teamed up with Kouki to take on Chika and Minami Yuuki. After the match, Goto asked Mayu for a singles match. Mayu responded, quizzing what weight she was at. Goto comically said “72…77 kilos.” Mayu said she’d give her a singles match, but to come back when she’s at 55kg if she wants to challenge for the Superfly Title. In the semi-main event, Seri Yamaoka debuted new gear. It looked a lot better. She went back and forth with rookie Yuuka Yamazaki before folding her with the spinning side suplex and picking up the win with the Aoki clutch. Seri had a terrifying spear where she almost landed on her head – this show was the second time I had seen her bump for the spear like that.

In the main event, Rea Seto turned heel and joined Dark Revolution. Seto accidentally hit Yuzuki when breaking up a pin. They started shoving each other, and Yuzuki was clearly bullying Seto around, who was in tears. Seto got really mad and lashed out, beating up Yuzuki and hitting her over the head with DR’s signature chair. Funnily, Misa casually walked up to Yuzuki and pinned her with La Magistral for the win. After the match, Misa instigated Seto by saying “yeah, I guess it’d be unbearable staying under Victoria Yuzuki’s shadow forever!” Seto said that she was never under Yuzuki’s shadow and will join DR to make sure Yuzuki and Seri Yamaoka don’t get too arrogant.

I thought the idea was that Seto is a very emotional person and was tired of being bullied, and so joined DR because she wanted to feel bigger and stronger than she is. DR was likely just taking advantage of her. That’s a well known movie trope. Seto pulled off some subtle facial expressions hinting at her uncertainty of joining and backstage, while crying, Nozaki dismissively asked her to stop crying. However, on the Korakuen Hall show days later, she was acting aggressively heelish which makes me think they are just trying to turn her into a proper heel.

This was made more obvious on 19th July when Rea strangled Kizuna Tanaka with her belt behind the referee’s back and looked happy doing so. The story is less interesting to me if she’s just a bad guy now, but maybe she can pull it off. On the same show, Shinno made her first appearance since 14th June as her summer school break had started.

© Marigold

On 20th July, MIRAI & Yuuka Yamazaki faced Utami & Yuzuki. Yuzuki may have been watching Dragongate’s rookie, Homare, as she pulled out a new finisher, which is a running corkscrew senton. It didn’t look as clean as Homare’s but still quite good. I like to remind myself that Yuzuki has just under 2 years of experience and is one of the top workers in Marigold. She is getting better every time she goes out there, and she is not afraid of trying new stuff, which is important for improvement. In the main event, Chika, Miku and Minami Yuuki faced Mayu, Seri and Shinno. In a really good match, the best sequence was Shinno and Miku trading hard kicks with each other. Seri pinned Yuuki with the delayed German suplex. Yuuki got a lot of time to shine so if you wanted to check in on her development you should check out that match.

On 21st July, the trio of stars took on the best rookies of Marigold, as Mayu, MIRAI & Utami main evented with Seri, Shinno & Yuuka. This match was great, which I knew it was when I saw Mayu dropkick Yuuka’s head off near the start of the match. Later in the match, Seri destroyed Utami with a sick German suplex. MIRAI pinned Shinno after a lariat. I also want to note how confident Yuuka Yamazaki, 18, is for someone who has been wrestling for a month. I won’t say she is the best rookie around or anything, because she isn’t, but she has a unique confidence that was obvious on her debut. She is also solid in-ring. I think it’s great that all 3 rookies excel in different ways. Seri’s grappling and suplexes are outstanding, and she does not have an off-switch (not necessarily a good thing for career longevity). Shinno is the best overall ‘pro wrestler’, she’s good at all the intangibles that take rookies years to develop, e.g. selling, and could end up right there with other Rookie of the Year contenders. Also on the show, Seto attacked Mai Sakurai during her entrance and is wrestling as your average heel. Really weird decision for the person known to cry on a whim at the beginning of her promos (no matter their content).

© Marigold

Marigold News & Upcoming Shows

Marigold announced on 22nd July that they have finally opened a dojo for their wrestlers. Freelancer Shuji Kondo has been appointed as the coach. Kondo was a trainer in WRESTLE-1 until the promotion closed in 2020 and Rossy Ogawa mentioned that Utami Hayashishita was the one who recommended him. The press noted the link to Stardom coach Milano Collection AT, who came up with Kondo in Toryumon Japan and early Dragongate. Kondo lives in Shizuoka and will commute once or twice a week to provide sessions in the Tokyo dojo. Ogawa mentioned that the dojo cost just under ¥10 million (~£50,000 or ~$68,000), and they started with an empty warehouse but transformed it within a month. He also stated that they did not take a loan for it and used their existing revenues to purchase it.

Maya Yukihi, known for her work in Ice Ribbon and her tag team, Azure Revolution with Risa Sera, will debut on 16th August. Yukihi broke her left arm doing a diving crossbody in her first match as the Tiger Princess at “Strong Style Pro-Wrestling Vol. 32” on 5th December 2024. Yukihi recently tagged with Risa Sera in a losing effort to Team 200kg on their produce show on 9th July in her first proper match back. See our Azure Revolution review in our Ice Ribbon section for more details.

Marigold announced that Ryoko Sakimura has left the promotion, effective 31st July.

Marigold have released full details for their upcoming DreamStar Grand Prix. Here are the participants and blocks:

© Marigold

*Marvelous announced on 30th July that Senka Akatsuki’s pneumonia symptoms had worsened, and that she would be hospitalised for at least a week. As of writing, it is unclear when she will return and so Marvelous decided to replace her with Maria.

It’s quite a strong field, with some of the usual undercard wrestlers omitted. It also includes Marvelous’ super rookie Senka Akatsuki who will liven things up with her smothering pins and lariats. Marigold has Sumo Hall booked for 26th October, so I’d be shocked if they weren’t using this tournament to build a huge title match there. So with that, my prediction is that Mayu is going to win this tournament. She could either lose the Superfly Title to Mio Momono at Korakuen Hall on 13th October to further the inter-promotional rivalry, or just vacate it after Sumo Hall (not preferred). I don’t see another name in the tournament that Rossy would want to main event Sumo Hall with. They could also just have Mayu beat Utami in the block (30th August at Korakuen Hall), let someone else win the GP and then challenge Utami at the 13th October Korakuen Hall show in a losing effort to keep Utami & Mayu for Sumo Hall. In that case, I’d put Yuzuki or Miku as my ‘alternative predictions.’

The full schedule is as follows:

Here are some matches I’m excited for to give you a flavour if you’d like to parachute in – as always, your mileage may vary depending on your favourites. I’ll only mention the ones coming up before our next issue. It doesn’t mean that the ones not mentioned will be bad, but if they are match of the night contenders it would be a pleasant surprise.

© Marvelous Pro Wrestling

Japanese Indies

Best of the Rest

© Marvelous Pro Wrestling

Marvelous Pro Wrestling
Riko’s Birthday!

30th July 2025
Shin-Kiba 1st RING, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe (maybe in 3 weeks) / Zaiko

Marvelous celebrated Riko Kawahata’s birthday in the last show before their big Korakuen Hall event on 8th August. Senka Akatsuki was not available to participate, as she was recovering from pneumonia. The ace and double champion, Takumi Iroha, opened the show saying that Senka’s pneumonia symptoms had worsened and she would have to be hospitalised for a week, missing the 8th August show. The crowd were audibly sad when Takumi announced this, as Senka is a real crowd favourite. Sora Ayame came out to volunteer to fight for Marvelous against Marigold and take Senka’s place, which Takumi accepted. Chigusa Nagayo was also absent from the show due to illness.

The theme of Maria and Riko Kawahata’s heel run in recent months has been the older veterans trying to beat some sense into the brats. On this show, it was Takumi Iroha’s turn, once again, teaming up with Chikkattack partner Chikayo Nagashima to beat up the annoying Evil Magenta duo. Both Chikayo and Takumi have been locked up in a lorry by Evil Magenta at various points in the past couple of months, so they both looked to give them a whooping. Well, instead, Chikayo turned ‘heel’ and joined Evil Magenta. If this were over a month ago I would’ve not enjoyed it, but Maria and Riko have really nailed the vibes of goth, emo teens who approach every situation with total apathy. It all started when Magenta Irish whipped Chikkattack towards each other and they bonked and started slapping each other. They immediately hugged, but obviously it wouldn’t last. During the match, Magenta held Chikayo against the ropes and gave her black lipstick. She looked like she enjoyed it. Basically, this match was about Chikayo slowly morphing into one of Magenta. The match was otherwise solid, but nothing outstanding. The real reason Chikayo gave for her switched allegiance was that Takumi had ditched the Chikkattack team and created Spark Rush with Sareee. Chikayo felt betrayed, when she was the one that held onto the AAAW Tag Team Titles for Takumi while Takumi was out for a few months in 2023.

© Marvelous Pro Wrestling

Marvelous debuted a new foreign talent touring with them. Valentina Rossi, 29, is currently the NWA Women’s Tag Team Champion and only has 56 matches under her belt, with a lot of those being AEW Dark. Plucking obscure talent from the US independent scene is one of Nagayo’s favourite pastimes, so we will see how Rossi turns out. In her first outing, she was booked to team with top star Mio Momono to take on Itsuki Aoki and Sora Ayame. Rossi was billed on Marvelous’ Twitter as Noelle Giorgi (her shoot name), which I believe was a mistake as Rossi re-posted the match card on Facebook with her work name. We’ll refer to her as Valentina Rossi for now.

Marvelous are very good at getting characters over in how they are presented. Before the match, Aoki screamed her greetings at her opponents, as she normally does. Mio and Rossie reciprocated and got involved. Sora was just standing there watching them all, sheepishly shy as she always is, before all 3 looked at her. The crowd immediately clocked onto this and screamed for Sora to join in and yelled greetings at her opponents. She tried her best to muster a scream, but it was still quiet. These moments work because now whenever Sora cuts a fiery promo, it will catch people off guard and get people behind her immediately. That type of promo which rallied the crowd has already happened before, on 20th May when Spark Rush won the AAAW Tag Team Titles and the rookies challenged them. It’s the details that matter!

© Marvelous Pro Wrestling

Rossi wrestles as a big woman and uses her long legs for offense – split leg drop, big boots, etc. She is quite tall in Japan, so she started off with a shoulder tackle contest with resident powerhouse Aoki. Rossi worked over Sora’s arm with her long legs, and Mio was so impressed that she tried this herself, but with Mio’s short legs, it wasn’t as effective. Rossi is quite green, which makes sense with the number of matches she has, so she has made a great choice doing a tour in Marvelous and I hope it works out for her. I liked Aoki and Mio going at it, but it did miss a spark. Wait. Do I… do I miss Chigusa on commentary? No, no. Can’t be that. Maybe it was just a lack of crowd heat. This was a good match overall, especially the last few minutes. Sora is growing on me at an exponential rate since she has found her niche and leaned into it, rather than trying to do what Senka was doing. She is a very charming character. It only took 6 months, but better late than never. Mio playfully bullied Sora after the match, reminding us of the fun family vibes the promotion has.

The WCPW duo of Jiah Jewell and Levi Shapiro, who debuted on 20th July, faced off against each other and Dragongate’s Yosuke Santa Maria in a three-way match. Yosuke has been used regularly by Nagayo in recent months. Jiah taped his mouth before the match so Yosuke couldn’t kiss him. 10 days earlier, he was the one kissing Robert Martyr, but sure. Yosuke twisted Levi’s third leg before Jiah applied the ‘gator roll, sending Levi outside of the ring by accident. Jiah’s third leg was too strong for Yosuke so he repelled it by ‘gator snapping Yosuke’s private parts. Afterwards, they performed a sequence of running the ropes where it was in slow motion because Yosuke was tired, or something. Yosuke won after kissing Jiah and hitting a crucifix driver. Okay. A bit of a drop in quality from the Alexander-Clancy-Martyr trio. (Editor’s Note: And yet, somehow, I am Locked In.)

© Marvelous Pro Wrestling

In the opener, Sareee… wait, Sareee in the opener? Well, she had the task of beating some life into Ai Houzan who has been completely eclipsed by Senka, and even Sora. Sora doesn’t have as good an offense as Ai, but she has a deeper connection with the crowd, because 1) she is one of the Reiwa Crush Gals and 2) she is an amazing seller. I don’t mean that in a Shawn-Michaels-bumping type of way. I mean that when you watch Sora you will think she is actually in pain. And she could be, but that’s why she’s a good seller, you don’t actually know. Ai, however, is still yet to have a breakout moment 4 years into her career, which is more unusual in joshi wrestling due to how many matches they have. In the top two US promotions, opportunities for breakouts are slightly more fleeting, so it’s not unusual to not break out for many years. Ai is still only 22, so time is on her side. Her music is a great bop, though.

© Marvelous Pro Wrestling

Sareee’s belt came undone during the match, and I was sure she would use it to beat Ai. She teased strangling Ai with it, but then laughed and threw it away. The Sun God was merciful on this show. Takumi tried to sabotage her partner and threw the belt back in so that Ai could grab onto it and get closer to the ropes during a submission. After the 10 minute mark, Sareee had decided it was enough and began imprinting her forearm on Ai’s chest with a smile on her face. Sareee ran the ropes and then sort of… stumbled on top of Ai in what looked like a miscommunication, so they both just started headbutting each other, with Ai headbutting Sareee’s chest while in the full-mount position. That was hilarious. Ai fought through a basement dropkick, Northern Lights suplex and a double foot stomp, before succumbing to the second double foot stomp. This match was about Sareee’s floor in terms of quality, which is still a great match, but not any better than her matches against other rookies such as Stardom’s Aya Sakura and Ranna Yagami.

Full Results

Magenta (Maria & Riko Kawahata) defeat Chikayo Nagashima & Takumi Iroha (13:40)

Mio Momono & Valentina Rossi defeat Itsuki Aoki & Sora Ayame (16:26)

Yosuke Santa Maria defeats Jiah Jewell and Levi Shapiro (8:51)

Sareee defeats Ai Houzan (12:41)

© Sendai Girls Pro Wrestling

Marvelous Pro-Wrestling Oyama

20th July 2025
Oyama Cultural Center, Tochigi, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe (maybe in 3 weeks) / Zaiko

The shows away from Tokyo tend to be a bit more lighthearted and fun, as the goal is to make sure people keep coming back when Marvelous tour there next time. Because of that, there was nothing outstanding on this show from an in-ring perspective, and it was largely skippable, although the main event was very good.

The main event was the test of synergy of the reunited Bob Bob Momo Banana (Mio Momono & Yurika Oka) following Mio’s return from injury as they faced off against Takumi Iroha and Sora Ayame. Sora, of course, stood out like a sore thumb, considering she is still very green and not on the same development curve as Senka Akatsuki. However, Takumi and Sora are always a fun team to watch because it’s basically a handicap match, so if you’re watching on a weekend evening you can take a shot every time Takumi saves Sora from getting pinned. You might need a few bottles. To Sora’s credit, she has really developed the ability to pull off the craziest near falls, and has gotten over her prawn hold pin that she used for a nearfall on Marigold’s Victoria Yuzuki at Korakuen Hall on 16th July. The crowd basically exploded when Sora nearly pinned Mio with it on this show. Unfortunately for Sora, a Nagayo-style German suplex from Mio was all it took to beat Sora, while Yurika was on Takumi-guarding duty.

The semi-main event was Ai Houzan, Chikayo Nagashima & Itsuki Aoki taking on the very entertaining trio of Johnnie Robbie, Maria & Riko Kawahata. This would be Robbie’s last match in Marvelous on her tour. The Evil Magenta & Robbie trio was just pure chaos; I’m quite sad Robbie is leaving and that it took so long to unlock this trio. In the first few minutes there was a lot of manic crowd brawling. Evil Magenta repeated their house show gimmick by locking up Aoki and Chikayo in the back of a lorry again. This left them in the ring with Ai Houzan in a 3v1. The big screen showed the two in the back of a lorry, so apparently the cameraman was locked in there with them. Then, it was quite hard to tell why, but Evil Magenta rushed back out to the lorry to let them out and get them back in the ring. Maybe one of them was the tagged-in person and there were no count outs? Maria almost got splatted when the lorry door was opening again, as she didn’t know it would open the way it did. There was some really good action between Robbie and Houzan on the finishing stretch, including a pretty German suplex from Robbie to Houzan. Robbie pinned Houzan with the double knee drop to the back of the head. What a tour from Robbie. I’m still getting used to Evil Magenta but they are improving with each show. But when their old music plays and they drop the act, I will be a happy person.

© Marvelous Pro Wrestling

The streak of four straight main events for Senka came to an end. Senka was instead in the opener taking on Amira in a singles match. This was, not surprisingly, a fun match. They have similar wrestling styles and Amira made sure to lay in her chops. I’m not sure why we hadn’t seen it yet, but Amira rolled Senka over into her own pin during Senka’s smothering pin. Amira won after landing a heavy backfist into a World’s Strongest Slam. I think Nagayo wanted to remind us that Senka is still a rookie and brought us back to Earth. It felt like a throwback to one of Senka’s earlier matches.

Iroha opened the show introducing two new US wrestlers, Jiah Jewell and Levi Shapiro, both of whom are active roster members on the roster of Marvelous’ US partner, West Coast Pro Wrestling. Johnnie Robbie and Ryan Clancy are both advertised for WCPW’s “Cruel Summer” show on 26th July, so this was their last Marvelous show on this tour. Robert Martyr looked emotional and kissed the Marvelous logo on the way out of his match, as this was also his last show on the current tour. Amira posted on social media about the end of her tour.

Local wrestler, Tochigi Pro’s Takumi Baba, a regular freelancer for Marvelous, faced newcomers Jiah Jewell and Robert Martyr in a three way match. They did a bit where Martyr came out too early to Baba’s music and had to be told by Mio to go back. Martyr sheepishly ran back behind the curtain. Martyr leaned much more heavily into being a babyface on this show, which was good to see. This was a light-hearted match with the goal of putting over Jewell as a loveable underdog. Jewell really wanted to kiss the two. He eventually got his kiss on Martyr and Martyr returned the love by planting him with the Michinoku Driver.

Levi Shapiro faced Ryan Clancy in a ‘changing of the guard’ match, with Clancy on the way out and Shapiro on the way in. Levi worked over Clancy for most of it, so they tried to put Levi over before Clancy left. It was quite a long match which didn’t really take off at all. Levi tried to win with the Iron Claw but Clancy fought out of it. Levi landed his middle rope diving elbow for the win. Clancy had become a crowd favourite over the past few months with good babyface performances.

Full Results

Amira defeats Senka Akatsuki

Levi Shapiro defeats Ryan Clancy

Robert Martyr defeats Jiah Jewell and Takumi Baba

Johnnie Robbie, Maria & Riko Kawahata defeat Ai Houzan, Chikayo Nagashima & Itsuki Aoki

Bob Bob Momo Banana (Mio Momono & Yurika Oka) defeat Sora Ayame & Takumi Iroha

© Marvelous Pro Wrestling

Marvelous News & Upcoming Shows

Marvelous announced on 29th July that Senka Akatsuki’s pneumonia symptoms had worsened, and that she will be unavailable for shows in the foreseeable future. Maria has replaced Senka in Marigold’s Dream Star Grand Prix.

Marvelous have announced the top matches for their 8th August Korakuen Hall show. It is held on that date (or close to) every year as it commemorates Chigusa Nagayo’s debut date. There will once again be a 5-on-5 elimination match between Marigold and Marvelous, but this is the first time it will be happening in Marvelous. Ai Houzan, Maria, Mio Momono, Riko Kawahata & Sora Ayame will be taking on Marigold’s Komomo Minami, Miku Aono, Seri Yamaoka, Utami Hayashishita & Victoria Yuzuki. Marvelous held a press conference on 29th July building up the match; Senka couldn’t attend so we didn’t get any clothes ripping, but Seri said she wanted Senka to enter first so that she could beat her up. Unfortunately, Senka later had to withdraw so we will not get to see that. Evil Magenta said that another elimination match was boring and then walked out of the press conference. Mio said she hadn’t faced Komomo before and will beat her up so badly she won’t want to do another Marigold vs. Marvelous match.

The main event will be Spark Rush vs. Team 200kg (Chihiro Hashimoto vs. Yuu) for the AAAW Tag Team Titles. This match will be awesome, it is one of the few Team 200kg matches I would genuinely get excited for, and that’s for one reason. Sareee and Hashimoto have a legendary rivalry, extending to Sareee’s time before she left for the US. Every time they wrestle, it is one of my top joys in wrestling. I was wondering if Marvelous would choose to defend the tag titles over Takumi’s AAAW Title, so I’m not sure what the plan for that title is. I am guessing either it will be used in the Marigold rivalry and taken by Utami, or Mio will go after it as that is the only direction Marvelous have hinted at, and Mio hasn’t held it since a 94-day reign in 2023.

At the press conference, Yuu mocked Spark Rush for letting AI choose their team name (which Sareee admitted to as they closed one of the shows). Yuu said that she asked ChatGPT what their name should be and it replied with “Meat and Friendship.” Yuu said that they’re glad that they didn’t choose their name with AI. Sareee wasn’t in a mood for fun and said she doesn’t care about jokes and will beat them up. Yuu made fun of Sareee getting booed in Stardom. Hashimoto complimented Senka and said that she wants to raise the level of women’s wrestling, and that she’s sure she’ll cross paths with Utami Hayashishita one day.

Additionally, Valentina Rossi, who debuted on 30th July in the promotion, will team with Chikayo Nagashima to take on Itsuki Aoki and X (as of writing, unknown, as Sora replaced Senka in the Marigold versus Marvelous match).

Wrestle Universe uploaded the 21st June Kariya (still not on Cagematch) and the 27th June Shin-Kiba shows on 28th July. So an update on the cadence of uploads is that it’s 3 to 5 weeks, unless the show was in Hokkaido (31st May and 1st May Sapporo shows are still missing).

© bbm

Sendai Girls

Senjo The New Era
19th July 2025
Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe

Sendai Girls don’t run Korakuen Hall often, normally two to three times a year, so when they do – they try to make it count. The crowd showed up for the rare show, although Sendai Girls do not announce attendance at all, it looked like there were at least 1,000 as the orange seats were quite full, more-so than All Japan’s 855 number days earlier. This was a good show capped off with a great main event.

The former Sendai Girls Tag Team Champions Red Energy (Mika Iwata & Miyuki Takase) have been having one of the best under-the-radar years out of any tag team in the world. They have been on fire in multiple promotions across the scene; for example, they had a random 20 minute banger with Ayako Sato & Hanako Nakamori in Diana in February. No one talks about Red Energy because it is just sort of expected at this point. Red Energy, despite how well known they are, are still the most underrated duo in the scene today.

Going into this match, I believed it made sense for Red Energy to retain the titles against Team 200kg (Chihiro Hashimoto & Yuu). Team 200kg have teamed together for 11 of Sendai Girls’ 20 shows in 2025. Since their last big show on 19th March, 200kg have teamed up on 10 of the 12 shows. I don’t have an issue with 200kg, I think they are really good, but they are currently quite overexposed. It is exacerbated by the fact that Yuu, in her retirement year, is mostly in ‘greatest hits’ mode. That is to say – all her matches follow a similar formula. While Hashimoto is incredible and can pull off any type of match, Yuu struggles to keep up with that dynamism. I recognise that others may not feel this way, but for me, the first 10 minutes of a Yuu match get sucked into a black hole of repetition, and I only tune in for the closing stages of the match or if Hashimoto tags in.

It made sense to me to let Red Energy continue shining. Give them a landmark year and let them capture titles in other promotions. Give Yuu’s last few months to the younger talent in Sendai Girls who need to continue growing such as YUNA and Yura Suzuki. I was even more convinced of this view when you consider that Sendai Girls is going into their 20th anniversary, but before that, they have three huge shows: 24th August at the 5,000 capacity Xebio Arena in Sendai; 23rd September at the 2,700 capacity Sun Plaza Hall in Sendai; and 16th November for Hashimoto’s 10th anniversary in Korakuen Hall. While I don’t doubt 200kg’s ability to put on great matches, as seen today, trusting them to main event those shows and draw large crowds is a big ask. Even Hashimoto herself conceded in her post-match promo that singles matches are generally what are accepted as big main events, but she dismissed that notion, wanting to change that perception. Sendai Girls announced that Team 200kg would defend their titles against Lena Kross & VENY at Xebio Arena. It just doesn’t seem like a main event that will draw as much as a new singles match for Hashimoto. In fact, this is the third time that these two teams will be facing each other for the Sendai Girls Tag Team titles and to be blunt – it’s not a blockbuster feud. They later announced Mika Iwata vs. Sareee on the same card. Just imagine the continuation of the Sareee-Hashimoto feud main eventing the show instead.

I love this promotion, and I love Hashimoto, so I am just hoping that whatever they do, it is successful and pushes the scene forward. Their ambition in booking such big arenas is a really refreshing thing to see, taking advantage of a hot Japanese wrestling scene (for everyone except New Japan, Big Japan and Ice Ribbon, sadly). Nevertheless, Sendai Girls made the decision to belt up 200kg for the upcoming huge shows, going the way of Marvelous in trusting the ace as their double champion. If you’re going to trust anyone, then Hashimoto is that person, but you can’t defend both titles on a show. The title change feels like a way to give Yuu time in the sun before she retires and end her career with a very strong Team 200kg run, so we will see what she can give back and who she puts over before she leaves.

© bbm

With all that said, I really liked the main event of this show between 200kg and Red Energy, and to be honest, that’s mainly because it was just Iwata and Hashimoto going at it. Iwata, never the bride, always the bridesmaid, was determined to stake out her place in Sendai Girls and was the clear focal point of this match. She ran into an early brick wall as Team 200kg attempted to slowly break her spirit. Iwata turned things around when she caught Hashimoto with an armbar over the rope and penalty kicked her in the chest, leading to loud “Iwata” chants. Iwata working with Hashimoto was by far the highlight of this match, which should be expected given how much they’ve worked with each other. You know what you are watching is great when the crowd is popping for Hashimoto nearly catching Iwata with a German suplex. Hashimoto called for the powerbomb, but Iwata rolled through for a near fall. Team 200kg then hit simultaneous powerbombs on Red Energy, but Iwata still held on. Yuu was angered that they kicked out and stacked them up into the corner for a cannonball, squishing them in the process. 200kg followed up with the Team 200kg Press and a final powerbomb from Hashimoto to win the match.

During intermission, weapons and foreign objects were set up in the ring for the semi-main event, a hardcore match between the “Hardcore Queen” herself, DASH Chisako, and Stardom’s Hazuki. The Queen was in her element, thrashing Hazuki all over Korakuen Hall. Back in the ring, Hazuki caned Chisako in the head before suplexing her from the top of a ladder onto a stack of chairs. Moments later, Chisako handed Hazuki her receipt and suplexed her onto the same set of chairs. Chisako placed Hazuki onto a shaky pair of tables outside the ring. Her idea was to climb the ladder in the ring and splash onto Hazuki. However, Hazuki smartened up, and pushed the ladder over, sending Chisako dangerously crashing through the tables. Only one of the tables broke as Chisako seemingly hit her head on the edge of the other one. You would be forgiven for believing the match was over as Hazuki hit her signature diving senton from the top of the ladder – but Chisako dramatically held on. Hazuki stole the win with La Magistral after Chisako missed her Hormone Splash crashing onto some chairs. After the match, it was clear that Hazuki had now gotten the Hardcore itch and proposed to do a Hardcore tag match, but Chisako told Hazuki it couldn’t be with Koguma. Aja Kong came out to set up Aja & Chisako vs. Hazuki & Risa Sera for the big Xebio Arena show on 24th August. Sera announced that she had injured her ACL and MCL but was pushing through for her retirement.

© Sendai Girls Pro Wrestling

In my personal main event, the reunited Bob Bob Momo Banana (Mio Momono & Yurika Oka) took on the stoic, hard-hitting team of Aja Kong & VENY. Momono was injured on 9th February in a Sendai Girls main event, in which Yurika valiantly finished the last 10-15 minutes of the match herself in one of her best performances to date. Mio returned to Marvelous on 13th July, but this was Bob Bob Momo Banana’s first match together since the injury. The team were putting on amazingly consistent performances in January before Mio went down, and in this match they picked up where they left off. Their plan to attack Aja and VENY off the bell gong wasn’t smart. Aja brushed them off and the fight spilled to the outside, which is where you don’t want to be against these two renowned crowd brawlers. VENY always puts in a shift, as we’ve seen her do in a Korakuen Hall full of 250 people; here was no different as she started off with a moonsault to the outside of the ring.

Mio protected her head from Aja’s trash can with her hat and then tried to go for her Nagayo-style German suplex, which Chigusa Nagayo recently told Mio she could have as she does it so well. It was Yurika’s time to take a shot at Aja, to no avail as she almost immediately found herself receiving a superplex. VENY was the nut they would try to have to crack next as they both assaulted her with a flurry of dropkicks. Aja had to come to VENY’s rescue, smashing the trashcan over Yurika’s head. Mio tried to block the trashcan with her hat again, but Aja just threw the trashcan away and used her fists and a backdrop suplex, an equally offensive set of weapons. A spin kick and moonsault from VENY was enough to put Yurika away. Great match.

© Sendai Girls Pro Wrestling

YUNA had another shot at Aya Sakura’s Sendai Girls Junior Title, with the last match ending in a win for Sakura in under 13 minutes. Sakura must have had some issues with her gear as she was sporting white trousers. YUNA attacked Sakura’s leg, hoping to neutralise her kicks, and applied a leglock for what felt like quite a long time, although their facial expressions sold the hold well. Sakura slapped her leg as if to shake off the pain before knocking YUNA down with a powerful kick. She then connected with brutal buzzsaw kicks to YUNA’s temple for a nearfall which got the crowd behind YUNA. Sakura finally put YUNA away with a messy, but still bridging, German suplex. The last few minutes of the match were great and Sakura is developing really well in her second year wrestling.

After the match, Sakura reminded YUNA that she was now 3-0 against her in singles matches, and it was YUNA’s fourth attempt at winning the belt. Sakura suggested that YUNA face some of the rookies and youngsters in Stardom, as there aren’t many young colleagues in Sendai Girls for her to beat in order to improve. YUNA said she’d face anyone and won’t stop until she has the belt. Backstage, Sakura praised Hashimoto’s training sessions that she’s been holding, available to younger wrestlers across all promotions.

Gojizones (Hiroyo Matsumoto & ZONES) teamed up with Yura Suzuki to take on EVO’s Chi Chi and freelancers Ryo Mizunami and Unagi Sayaka. ZONES beat Chi Chi for the EVO Strong Women’s Championship on 5th July and is currently aiming for the OZ Academy Tag Team Championships with Matsumoto. Suzuki is coming off a good performance in WAVE’s annual tournament. This was mostly a fun ‘house show-style’ match.

The opening bout was a fight between two wrestlers who will eventually end up holding their promotion’s world championship, Sendai Girls’ Manami and Stardom’s Sayaka Kurara. Kurara looked aggressive and a few minutes in attempted her patented Tokimeki spear but Manami stuffed it. Kurara connected with the spear moments later, but it wasn’t enough to put Manami down for 3. Manami pinned Kurara after a top rope splash.

Full Results

Manami defeats Sayaka Kurara (5:34)

Chi Chi, Ryo Mizunami & Unagi Sayaka defeat Hiroyo Matsumoto, Yura Suzuki & ZONES (9:44)

Sendai Girls Junior Title: Aya Sakura (c) defeats YUNA (12:31)

Aja Kong & VENY defeat Bob Bob Momo Banana (Mio Momono & Yurika Oka) (9:28)

Hardcore: Hazuki defeats DASH Chisako (17:19)

Sendai Girls Tag Team Title: Team 200kg (Chihiro Hashimoto & Yuu) defeat Red Energy (Mika Iwata & Miyuki Takase) (c) (21:39)

© Sendai Girls

Sendai Girls House Show Notes

On 13th July in Niigata, the inaugural EVO Strong Women’s Champion, ZONES, beat YUNA in a pretty uneventful opener. Prominence’s Hiragi Kurumi teamed with Stardom’s Yuria Hime in one of the most misfit tags I’ve seen in Sendai Girls. Kurumi was last in Sendai Girls on 19th May 2024 against Manami. On this show, Kurumi and Yuria faced Manami and Yura Suzuki. I’ve mentioned in the WAVE column how impressive Suzuki came out of their Catch the WAVE tournament. Well, I really liked Suzuki’s performance in this match and thought she was the standout, with Kurumi doing really well to get her over. Yuria didn’t really do much. Miku Kanae made her second Sendai Girls appearance teaming with Miyuki Takase to face Chi Chi & DASH Chisako. Chisako has been beating up Chi Chi for the past month, while Chi Chi is familiar with Miku as they train together. If you’ve seen these four, it was what you would expect – a very good match with a spotlight on Miku and Chisako. The main event was Team 200kg against Mika Iwata & Ryo Mizunami to preview Team 200kg vs. Red Energy. It was a pretty good, but standard, Team 200kg main event.

Sendai Girls held a more low-key show, with not much happening, on 21st July in Fukushima, with the women on tour with Marvelous (Amira & Johnnie Robbie) making another appearance. It was their last appearance in Japan before returning to the US. Gojizones Union (Hiroyo Matsumoto & ZONES) took on Amira & Miyuki Takase in a tune-up for their OZ Academy Tag Team Title match on 17th August (in OZ Academy). Matsumoto pinned Amira with a backdrop suplex. Johnnie Robbie lost in singles action against DASH Chisako. Aja Kong teamed with YUNA losing to Manami & Ryo Mizunami, who haven’t lost as a team since 12th January, so they are being set up for a 200kg defence. Team 200kg beat Chi Chi and Mika Iwata in another standard Team 200kg main event (good but not must-see).

Sendai Girls News & Upcoming Shows

Sendai Girls’ next show is on 3rd August in their usual Sendai PIT Arena. It will be broadcast on Wrestle Universe as a VOD on 7th August. The card for that show is as follows:

Sendai Girls have announced more matches for their big show in Xebio Arena, Sendai, on 24th August:

© @cthemoon

SEAdLINNNG
Shin-Kiba Series 2025 Vol. 4

26th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 243
Shin-Kiba 1st RING, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: seadlinnng.com

SEAdLINNNG returned after a prolonged break, with the last show being Makoto beating VENY to become the new Beyond The Sea Champion on 17th June. Funnily enough, Makoto must’ve been prebooked with Ice Ribbon as she was instead wrestling an 11-year-old in Yokohama while this SEAdLINNNG show was going on. This show was the final show before SEAdLINNNG’s 10th anniversary show on 22nd August at Korakuen Hall, so it served as the setup with a lot of matches being built. The only match announced for Korakuen Hall before this show was Makoto vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto for the Beyond The Sea Championship.

The show started with SEAdLINNNG owner Natsuki Taiyo reading out a letter from Yoshiko, announcing that she would return to the promotion. Yoshiko is known for assaulting Act Yasukawa during a match in Stardom in 2015. Act would go on to retire 10 months later, before making a comeback in Actwres girl’Z in 2019, where she still wrestles today. Yoshiko went on to work for a lot of the smaller independent companies such as WAVE and Diana, but primarily worked for SEAdLINNNG and OZ Academy. Her last match was 13th May 2022. She was injured in practice and has not returned since. Taiyo was emotional and was wearing a Yoshiko shirt.

In the main event, the Beyond The Sea Tag Team Champions (Ayame Sasamura & Itsuki Aoki) teamed up with Makoto’s challenger, Hiroyo Matsumoto to clash with Mio Shirai & Natsu Sumire (who are now a team in SEAdLINNNG) and VENY. I will come clean and say that I zoned out of the first 10 minutes because it was Natsu being beat up by Itsuki, as if Natsu is the babyface. No thank you. Once VENY was tagged in, the match transformed. She booted Itsuki in the face, did a front roll to open-hand slap Ayame on the apron, and then forearmed Matsumoto in the face who didn’t back down and returned the stiffest elbow possible – awesome. VENY is in my personal top 5 currently and I think she’s having an underrated 2025. The last stretch of the match was Mio and Ayame going at it, before Mio pinned Ayame. I figured this may happen when the match was announced to build a tag match at Korakuen Hall, and indeed that’s what happened. After Mio got what she wanted, she left with Natsu. Ayame was about to blame herself for the loss but broke down into real tears, and Itsuki had to calm her down before Matsumoto took the mic, explaining the weight that big matches have on the wrestlers.

If there is one thing I want to do with these columns, it’s to get one person to watch Ayame Sasamura. Someone please give Ayame Sasamura a massive bag of money to join a more popular promotion so that more people can see her. I keep buying the shows but there’s no way to tell SEAdLINNNG “I’m buying this because of Ayame.” I guess I’m just going to have to buy all her merch when I’m in Tokyo. (Editor’s Note: So the Hangman Page of SEAdLINNNG. Got it.)

© bbm

Yuki Funa, 28, who debuted on 20th March and injured her arm in that match, made her return against 19-year-old Dane, Madison Marley. Madison’s first match in SEAdLINNG was on 30th May, so while this is only her third match in Japan, she has been training in Japan for over 2 months, including partaking in Chihiro Hashimoto’s training sessions. Older rookies tend to have better selling and ability to convey emotions and Yuki looked confident in her performance. Madison dominated the match and won with the Falcon Arrow.

SEAdLINNNG’s other rookie who made her debut on 17th June, Selene Misora, 20, took on veteran and Las Fresa de Egoistas member, Nagisa Nozaki. Nagisa, the veteran in SEAdLINNNG, is great, compared to her Darkness Revolution character in Marigold. This was a good rookie versus veteran matchup. Selene didn’t take kindly to Nagisa rejecting her handshake and sprinted at her with a dropkick. She carried that aggression through the whole match in her comebacks, with stiff forearms to Nagisa’s chest and fighting out of several rear naked chokes until there was one choke too many.

Miria Koga, who has now passed 1 year as a wrestler, teamed with fellow SEAdLINNNG roster member Honori Hana to fight off the invading H.A.T.E. faction from Stardom. The new Goddess of Stardom Champions, BMI 2000 (Natsuko Tora & Ruaka) have been terrorising the SEAdLINNNG youngsters for months. This is the first time Honori has gotten involved as the older roster member, jumping in to aid SEAdLINNNG’s future. As an aside, Honori’s theme is a banger. This match started off hot, with Miria literally shoving Honori out of the ring as she was so fired up for revenge. After my suspicions from the last show, I can now confirm that Honori going blow-for-blow, shoot-headbutt-for-shoot-headbutt with VENY in their title match has transformed the way I see her. While I still don’t see her as a star, I definitely see her as an upper midcarder who can have big matches and put in a good performance. This match was really fun; it was the best type of Natsuko match, where her heel tactics worked and really put over Miria. As a result, Miria looked as good as she ever had despite losing in the same way she did in the singles match on the show before – Natsuko’s diving splash. They announced Honori and Miria in a different tag match for the Korakuen Hall show, so I’m not sure when this feud will get blown off. Maybe at the September show.

The resident luchadores duo, Ka Kedita (Kakeru Sekiguchi) and La Pidita (Kaho Kobayashi) faced Unagi Sayaka and YuuRI in a high-speed match. Kaho as La Pidita is my wrestling guilty pleasure. For those unfamiliar, the high speed matches fill out a more light-hearted spot lower down on the card, have fast 2 counts and a special referee, owner Natsuki Taiyo, who does a spot in almost every match. Things fell apart in this match when Kaho thought YuuRI was going for an O’Connor roll but instead tripped up Kaho, leading Kaho to bump awkwardly high on her back. She seemed completely out of it for the rest of the match with mistimed spots, although she finished the match, winning with the 120% Schoolboy.

Full Results

Madison Marley defeats Yuki Funa (6:21)

High Speed: Ka Kedita & La Pidita defeat Unagi Sayaka & YuuRI (5:20)

Nagisa Nozaki defeats Selene Misora (7:45)

HATE (Natsuko Tora & Ruaka) defeat Honori Hana & Miria Koga (10:20)

Mio Shirai, Natsu Sumire & VENY defeat Ayame Sasamura, Hiroyo Matsumoto & Itsuki Aoki (17:52)

© seadlinnng

SEAdLINNNG News & Upcoming Shows

SEAdLINNNG will host their 10th anniversary show on 22nd August at Korakuen Hall. The card is currently as follows:

In the main event, the storyline hook is that Makoto and Hiroyo Matsumoto are classmates and wrestled together early on in their careers in Ice Ribbon. Matsumoto’s motivation is that she does not want to retire quietly, and was inspired by Makoto’s Promo of the Year to VENY on the 30th May. To be honest, it’s a bit of a rushed program, especially as Makoto couldn’t make the 26th July show to build it further. They are relying on the in-built storyline between classmates to carry it.

For the “Pure Blood” tag, all four participants are SEAdLINNG trainees. Honori debuted in 2019 with a 2 year break in-between due to COVID complications, still not yet capturing any titles, and Miria Koga is just over a year into her career. Selene and Yuki are SEAdLINNNG’s 2025 class of rookies, with it being far too early to tell how they will pan out, as they both have 2 matches under their belt. We’ve spoken before about SEAdLINNNG reliance on outsiders since Arisa Nakajima’s retirement, with the last 3 champions all freelancers: Sareee, VENY and Makoto.

Other confirmed participants are the Tag Champions Ayame Sasamura & Itsuki Aoki, Las Fresa de Egoistas (VENY & Nagisa Nozaki), La Pidita, Ka Kedita, Mima Shimoda, Mio Shirai, Miyuki Takase, Natsu Sumire, Rina Yamashita, Ryo Mizunami, Unagi Sayaka and further to be announced.

SEAdLINNNG have cancelled their 14th October show at Shinjuku FACE and replaced it with a 4th October show at Culttz Kawasaki.

© Pro-Wrestling Evolution

Pro-Wrestling Evolution
EVO News & Upcoming Shows

EVO’s next show is #37 on 6th August. The Astronauts return to action in EVO as Fuminori Abe takes on Shuji Ishikawa and Takuya Nomura faces BURST PRO’s Towa Iwasaki. Suwama faces off against EVO regular Aki Shizuku.

The Ito Dojo duo of Chi Chi & Miku Kanae face off against Chika & Yuu. Chi Chi trains regularly with Miku Kanae under the stewardship of Kaoru Ito, Yumiko Hotta and Sareee. Chi Chi and Miku have most recently appeared as seconds for Sareee in Stardom, as well as getting into the ring against H.A.T.E. at Stardom’s Korakuen Hall show. Chi Chi is starting her journey back to challenge ZONES. They both vowed to make each other jealous so that they could cross paths again for the title. Chi Chi will be looking to build up an impressive record of wins before she re-challenges, while ZONES will be looking to be a strong champion with great title defences.

In the main event, Soy challenges ZONES for the EVO Strong Women’s Championship. The storyline is quite simple and was set up with one promo – Soy wants to test herself and asked ZONES to check whether she thought Soy could make it into becoming a strong pro wrestler. Soy has been working in a lot of promotions, but mostly in ChocoPro where she had an unsuccessful challenge for the Asia Dream Tag Team Title in May. Soy started working in ChocoPro in September 2024 (#393) and most recently worked a singles match with Emi Sakura on 18th July (#462), so Soy is trying her hardest to improve and climb the ladder. Soy already has 61 matches under her belt in 2025, as of writing.

In an example of what ZONES will do as champion to make Chi Chi jealous, Shuji Ishikawa & ZONES teamed up to take on the Triple Love Hawk duo, MICHIKO & T-Hawk, in GLEAT on 24th July. ZONES pinned MICHIKO with the Death Valley Driver in a good match. After the match, Triple Love Hawk’s other member, Ryo Aitaka, issued a challenge for him and T-Hawk against the Violent Giants (Ishikawa and Suwama) for 21st August. You can also CTRL+F “Chi Chi” and “ZONES” to see what else they get up to, as the EVO talent are all over the place.

© Ice Ribbon

Ice Ribbon
New Ice Ribbon #1432

21st July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 93
Kitazawa Town Hall, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Ice Ribbon Live (PPV or in 1 month with subscription)

Ice Ribbon held a PPV show at Kitazawa Town Hall, Tokyo. These are their B-level shows along with their Yokohama (Sanbo or Radiant Hall) and Ota City Industrial Plaza shows. Hot Shushu (the promotion Arisa Shinose and the Hiiro twins regularly wrestle in) were running an evening event in the same venue as part of the same PPV ticket, but that show is perhaps a level above being a sicko that I won’t cover.

In the main event of the Ice Ribbon show, ICExInfinity Champion Manami Katsu teamed up with Prime Link (Ibuki Hoshi & Kaho Matsushita) as a trio of Ice Ribbon’s top stars. They took on the JTO duo of Misa Kagura & Sumika Yanagawa as well as freelancer and SEAdLINNNG’s top champion, Makoto. Katsu and Kagura are currently building towards a title match, which will take place at Korakuen Hall on 24th August. The feud has turned around my view on Kagura, who I didn’t think much of when I saw her on other cards such as “Sareee-ISM”. Kagura has cut really good promos and wrestled with a good intensity. It is a bit of an odd choice, though, if they want to draw more than 300 people to Korakuen Hall. At least this Korakuen is on a Sunday rather than a weekday. I do feel bad for Katsu who works two jobs (one as a dental assistant) and puts her body on the line with a hard-hitting style, all for less than half empty arenas in front of 50 to 300 people.

© Ice Ribbon

Anyway…my bi-weekly shilling of Katsu aside, the main event was really good. Any combination of wrestlers tagged in worked well together, which always makes for the best multi-person matches. Ibuki destroyed Katsu with a German that Katsu bumped on her side (oof). Kagura was left in a 1v3 and absorbed superkick after superkick. Her teammates tried to help her, but Katsu’s team was able to fend them off. This match’s purpose was to put over Kagura as a worthy challenger. Katsu accidentally double stomped Ibuki, as Kagura was smart enough to move out of the way after studying Katsu in the past weeks. Kagura finished Ibuki off with her diving senton. Kagura challenged Katsu for her title at Korakuen Hall on 24th August, which Katsu accepted as she had secured the victory in a match with Ice Ribbon’s 6 top talent (even though 3 are freelancers). Kagura closed out the show, so the bit with Katsu not closing out the shows continued.

Australian wrestler Lil Marz teamed up with freelancer Akane Fujita to face the team of Kirari Wakana and Miku Kanae who are on a quest to get their tag titles back from Bad Butts (Ancham & Yappy), but have not had any big wins yet. Miku is still booked like a rookie in Ice Ribbon although it is clear she has developed far beyond that. Kirari picked up the win with a schoolboy on Lil Marz, so their road to the tag titles has begun. After the match, Akane said no one challenges for her FantastICE Championship, so she’s going to challenge for one. She said Katsu beat her for the singles so that’s out of the question, she has no friends so can’t go for the tag titles, so she’ll challenge for the Triangle Ribbon Title on the next show.

© Ice Ribbon

One of my favourite makeshift teams to watch right now, Ancham and PURE-J’s Crea, clashed with Arisa Shinose & Moe Hiiro. Crea’s usual teammate is AKARI in her home promotion but she started working more regularly for Ice Ribbon when Yappy left for the Philippines at the end of June. Crea had new gear and matching black make-up and looked awesome. Crea has a great striking ability and enjoys hitting hard, as Shinose found out when she was slapped right in the face. The new team of Ancham and Crea still weren’t on the same page, as Ancham hit Crea with a double foot stop. Ancham destroyed Moe with a cracking buzzsaw kick while Crea delivered her signature delayed German suplex on Shinose for the win (I love that move).

Totoro Satsuki, Choun Shiryu and Minoru Fujita faced off in a match for the Triangle Ribbon Title. I was already soured on this whole Totoro going for the Triangle Ribbon Title thing since it was set up at the June Korakuen Hall in a terrible waste of time “No Contest”, when they’re supposed to want people to come to their empty shows. This match did not do anything to change my view on that. I know it’s the comedy division now, but they could be more creative. I didn’t even get to see Shiryu do some cool shit because he was drowning in Totoro’s attempt at comedy. Shiryu and Fujita both ‘comically’ fell on top of Totoro, so Fujita retained. Totoro said she isn’t giving up, which set up the Akane Fujita, Minoru Fujita and Totoro match on the 26th July show.

In the last issue, I said I was very much looking forward to Mase Hiiro beating the crap out of her elder and fellow elementary schooler, Riko, who is 11. Mase had no regard for life the last time they interacted and cranked her neck back in a camel clutch which must’ve hurt. Unfortunately, Mase was much tamer this time out and maybe got told to tone it down. She picked up the win with a variation of La Magistral.

Full Results

Mase Hiiro defeats Riko (5:07)

Ancham & Crea defeat Arisa Shinose & Moe Hiiro (10:18)

Triangle Ribbon Title: Minoru Fujita (c) defeats Chon Shiryu and Totoro Satsuki (10:00)

Kirari Wakana & Miku Kanae defeat Akane Fujita & Lil Marz (10:18)

Makoto, Misa Kagura & Sumika Yanagawa defeat Ibuki Hoshi, Kaho Matsushita & Manami Katsu (15:10)

© Ice Ribbon

New Ice Ribbon #1433

26th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 126
Yokohama Sanbo Hall, Yokohama, Japan
Watch On: Ice Ribbon Live (PPV or 1 month after with subscription)

Almost a week after the Kitazawa PPV, Ice Ribbon held another PPV in Yokohama, the last on their road to Korakuen Hall on 24th August, with only the weekly Dojo shows left on the schedule. There was no Manami Katsu on the card; she had already built up her Korakuen match on the previous PPV, and her absence was felt. The show was quite low quality for a PPV with the main event being the only good match. The rest of the matches weren’t bad, but just fine.

The show was headlined by rookie Kirari Wakana’s seven-match challenge. Kirari has lost every single challenge so far (of course) to UK independent wrestler Blueshe, Miyuki Takase and Unagi Sayaka. In her fourth challenge, she had to overcome Rina Yamashita. One small issue was that Kirari refused to hit Yamashita hard. Yamashita had to sell some really weak forearms throughout the match and she was pleading with her to hit her harder. It’s one of many things promotions like Ice Ribbon, SEAdLINNNG, etc. do well in main events – hard hitting action. Kirari is still only a year into her career, but comparing her to the two rookies in SEAdLINNNG who are just 2 matches into their careers, she’s already behind in terms of showing babyface fire. Yamashita’s performance was as good as it could be and she tried her best. After the match, it was announced that Kirari’s 5th challenge will be Kaori Yoneyama at Korakuen Hall.

In the semi-main event, Bad Butts were at full strength as Yappy returned from the Philippines, teaming up with Ancham & Crea to face off against Cute Tag (Lil Marz & Misa Kagura) and Arisa Shinose. Yes, they do come out to “Baby Got Back” by Sir Mix-a-Lot. This match was fine, but like most of the card, it was house-show quality.

© Ice Ribbon

Makoto, the SEAdLINNNG Champion, skipped out on SEAdLINNNG’s once a month show at Shin-Kiba 1st RING to take on Mase Hiiro. Of course, it was probably booked way in advance, it’s just funny to think that she did the Drake meme, saying no to building a feud with Hiroyo Matsumoto for SEAdLINNNG’s 10th anniversary show at Korakuen in August, but yes to facing the 6-7 year old Mase Hiiro. Well, at least it looked like she was having fun. Makoto wanted to murder Mase with Cloud’s sword from Final Fantasy, but Mase’s mother made Makoto feel bad and stopped her plans. Mase then picked up the giant sword and stabbed Makoto with it. I guess that’s the fun of being a freelancer! Earlier in the show, Mase’s older sister, Moe, pinned Riko with the Cutie Special after Mase already beat Riko on the last show.

The show opened up with a 3-minute exhibition match between the returning Tsukina Umino and new trainee Miu Naoe. Tsukina has been out since January 2025 with a fractured collarbone. Miu Naoe is set to debut on 31st August in Yokohama. Naoe has come through the “Venus” theatre group, which is partnered with Ice Ribbon, and is advised by the recently retired Hikari Shimizu, known for her work in WAVE. Venus is one of their talent pipelines which was launched in April 2025, so this is their first graduate from that affiliation. Venus performs every other month with full cooperation from Ice Ribbon, using their dojo and ring, but they are not owned by Ice Ribbon.

Minoru Fujita was tasked with defending his Triangle Ribbon Title against FantastICE Champion Akane Fujita and Totoro Satsuki. Give me SEAdLINNNG’s high-speed mid-card comedy matches over these Triangle Ribbon matches any day. I don’t know why, but Akane is a sicko who does shoot headbutts in a comedy match. Minoru retained after a 15-minute time limit draw.

Full Results

Exhibition Match: Miu Naoe vs. Tsukina Umino – Time Limit Draw (3:00)

Moe Hiiro defeats Riko (6:49)

Makoto defeats Mase Hiiro (7:18)

Triangle Ribbon Title: Minoru Fujita (c) vs. Akane Fujita vs. Totoro Satsuki – Time Limit Draw (15:00)

Kaori Yoneyama defeats Kaho Matsushita (6:55)

Ancham, Crea & Yappy defeat Arisa Shinose, Lil Marz & Misa Kagura (12:58)

Rina Yamashita defeats Kirari Wakana (17:20)

© Ice Ribbon

Ice Ribbon Dojo Show Notes

On the Dojo show on 12th July (#1430), Riko opened the show facing her coach, Kaho, in her first ever singles match, building up to her singles match with fellow kid Mase Hiiro on the 21st July show. Kaho is one of Ice Ribbon’s veterans who trains people at the Dojo, at the age of 22. The best part of the match was Kaho connecting with a stiff kick, but she’s still not at Katsu’s level of (playfully) bullying the youngsters. In the second match, IR’s 2017 class (Ibuki, 22 and Totoro, 36) clashed with IR’s 2024 class (Kirari, 19 & Mase, less than 10). A lot of the smaller joshi promotions have new wrestlers of all ages. Ibuki is great and she played the Manami Katsu role in this match (beating the hell out of the kids). She pinned Kirari with a sick running knee strike.

Lil Marz took on Arisa Shinose and Ancham in a Triangle match (three way). Ancham was Irish whipped into the corner going for the usual spot, where you pull yourself up on turnbuckle so the opponent running towards you misses. Well, instead of getting high enough for the opponent to miss her and crash into the corner, Ancham kept her knees up, smacking the incoming Lil Marz in the face, and then Ancham drilled a kick into her head. Ancham is so good that I cannot tell if it was a botch and the kick after was just a receipt, or if it was planned. I’ve rewatched it several times. Probably a botch, but if so, it was a fun one.

In the main event, Katsu and Kagura previewed their upcoming title match. Katsu teamed with Moe, 13, and Kagura teamed with her JTO Girls Tag Team Champion partner, Sumika Yanagawa. A bit unfair if you ask me. Moe is quite impressive for her level of experience and age. Kagura cut a great promo talking about how much it would mean to her to beat Katsu. It would help her find her way and what her path is going to be after she leaves JTO and becomes a freelancer in August. She said that she was grateful for Ice Ribbon as she said that JTO offered too few matches. Yanagawa looked like she was tearing up. Kagura has been really good going up against Katsu and I’m looking forward to their title match. They continued the bit of Katsu not being able to close out a show as Kagura steamrolled her into the outro, not letting her respond to Kagura’s emotional promo.

© Ice Ribbon

The Dojo show the week after on 19th July (#1431) had multiple special rules matches. It was a “July-born” produce show. There’s one person in Ice Ribbon who was born in July. Tsukasa Fujimoto. As Kirari debuted in July, Tsukasa set her up with a 1st anniversary special match in the main event against WAVE’s Honoka, making her Ice Ribbon debut. The match was quite good, but it’s hard to judge Kirari’s progress when most of her offense is basic moves, dropkicks and schoolboys. I’d understand that during her seven singles matches challenge against vets, but in a 14 minute main event against someone only 1 year older than her, I thought there’d be more. She is fine at selling and getting beat up, but I’d say a lot of rookies are, and there are some amazing rookies in the scene in 2025.

Riko took on Totoro Satsuki in a match where the first to 5 points, or a pinfall/submission, wins. During the match a bell would ring to pause the match. Points were gained when they answered questions correctly or completed the challenge. The first challenge was to thread a needle. I know this was a shoot because Riko was done instantly. I was very worried Riko was going to jeopardise Ice Ribbon’s first ¥1million gate at Korakuen in August as Riko instantly threading the needle obviously wasn’t agreed to before the segment. The next challenge was to calculate Tsukasa’s birthday but squared (30th July, so 730×730). This was worked, Kirari had to come in and help Riko while Totoro pretended to calculate, but not very well. Riko still got it wrong. Kirari came back in to try a third time. Totoro got bored of waiting and got the answer, 1-1. The third challenge was that Riko had to play the flute while Totoro sang. We found something that Totoro is great at, 2-1 to Totoro. The fourth challenge was performing a backflip using the opponent’s arm. I don’t need to describe what happened. See above image of Totoro/Riko size comparison, 2-2. The fifth challenge was drawing a picture of Tsukasa, which the crowd judged Riko to be the winner, 3-2 to Riko. Afterwards, Totoro put Riko in a Boston crab and won. Totoro’s bad selling of the math challenge took this match a few notches down for me. ****1/2

Ibuki Hoshi took on Miku Kanae in a Keigo Rules match, where not using honorifics or the polite form of Japanese during the match would incur a points penalty. If a wrestler reached -10 points, they would automatically lose. Miku was off to a bad start, -4 to 0 within the first minute. She struggled through Ibuki’s chops being as polite as possible. Ibuki lost her cool from there on out, losing -10 to -8. Elsewhere on the show, Shinose, Kaho, Lil Marz and Yanagawa had a Tsukasa impersonation match where they had to use Tsukasa moves only. Kaho pinned Lil Marz with the Venus Clutch. Pretty fun Dojo show. Not one for the pure workrate fans. One for the Tsukasa fans. Maybe.

© Ice Ribbon

Azure Revolution RETURNS

09/07/2025
Company Announced Attendance: 278
Shinjuku FACE, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: YouTube (membership required)

The former Azure Revolution (Maya Yukihi & Risa Sera), who debuted as a tag team in Ice Ribbon in 2015, reunited after 3 years when they held their own produce show on 9th July. During their first International Ribbon Tag Team Championship reign, they defended the title 7 times, and they have 550 days combined as tag team champions in Ice Ribbon. After Ice Ribbon, Sera went on to create the popular freelancer stable Prominence, while Yukihi continued working with OZ Academy and 666 and making appearances in SEAdLINNNG and Marvelous.

Yukihi broke her left arm doing a diving crossbody in her first match as the Tiger Princess at “Strong Style Pro-Wrestling Vol. 32” on 5th December 2024. While still clearly injured, she returned for one night only on her 10th anniversary show in February, as it had already been organised. She has mostly worked comedy matches here and there since then. Given that, I was very curious to see how her performance would be in the main event where Azure Revolution faced Team 200kg (Chihiro Hashimoto & Yuu).

Amazingly, this was the first time Hashimoto and Sera had interacted with each other in a ring. Team 200kg bullied AzureRevo early until Yuu’s steamroller accidentally ran over Hashimoto. The match spilled to the outside as Yukihi whacked Yuu with a soft drink can. Yukihi tagged in around the 7 minute mark. Soon after, Hashimoto put Yukihi in an abdominal stretch, pulling back on Yukihi’s left arm in what was the only spot targeting Yukihi’s formerly broken arm. It was noticeable that Yukihi was protecting her left arm while bumping, not in an obvious way, though. Everyone was working stiff with their forearms and kicks in this match, including Yukihi, which helped to add some heat. Sera was pinned after she was flattened by a Team 200kg sandwich.

This match was good, but nothing you need to go out of your way to see, and it certainly didn’t crack Team 200kg’s top 3 matches this year. The novelty in this match was seeing AzureRevo reunited, and how Yukihi was getting on in her (actual) comeback match. After the match, Yukihi took the microphone and said that her arm felt good. In backstage promos, Sera teased continuing with AzureRevo during her retirement run. Yukihi was asked by an interviewer how her arm was and Yukihi replied saying it was “totally fine.” Yukihi said that she’s learnt some new moves that don’t rely on her using her left arm. From the match, I’d say that’s certainly true. That makes me believe that her arm probably isn’t fine, and instead she’s going to adapt and wrestle with the injury in order to accompany Sera on her retirement road. We’ll see if Yukihi takes some other bookings in the near future, but for now, it was a feel-good comeback.

The semi-main event was quite good; in particular, VENY was awesome (as per usual). She had some great back and forth action with WAVE star Kohaku and hit a crazy german suplex on PURE-J’s Rydeen Hagane (who is much larger).

A week after the event, on 15th July, Risa Sera announced on Twitter that she had ACL and MCL injuries, but would continue to wrestle until her retirement. She was hobbling during her matches in Diana and WAVE afterwards, so we’ll see how that works out, but that surely puts a dent in AzureRevo’s tag team run ambitions. Maya Yukihi is due to debut in Marigold teaming with Mai Sakurai against Miku Aono and Kouki Amarei on 16th August.

Full Results

Nagisa Nozaki & Natsu Sumire defeat Chi Chi & Makoto (11:21)

Hiragi Kurumi & Mochi Natsumi defeat Maya Yukipe (Konaka) & Risa Nisera (Onryo) (12:38)

Battle Royal: Itsuki Aoki defeats Chie Ozora and HANAKO and Kakeru Sekiguchi and Maika Ozaki and Mizuki Kato and Saori Anou and Soy and Yuko Sakurai (23:46)

SAKI, Unagi Sayaka & VENY defeat Kohaku, Rina Amikura & Rydeen Hagane (15:20)

Team 200kg (Chihiro Hashimoto & Yuu) defeat Azure Revolution (Maya Yukihi & Risa Sera) (19:50)

© Diana

Diana
Risa Sera’s Homecoming

20th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 504
Sera Cultural Center, Sera, Japan
Watch On: Diana Live / Prominence YouTube (cut up highlights)

On 20th July in Risa Sera’s hometown of Sera (you see where the name came from), Diana held Sera’s last homecoming show before her retirement, with a great sold out crowd of 504. Last year in Sera, they drew 303, so it’s worth remembering this was their biggest non-Korakuen Hall crowd of 2025. It was a good show with a mix of Diana talent, Hiroshima-native wrestlers and Sera’s stablemates from Prominence. The semi-main and main event in particular were great.

In the main event, Sera teamed with Haruka Umesaki and the returning Miran to take on Prominence’s Mochi Natsumi and Nijumaru (Nanami & Rina Amikura). Miran was returning after dislocating her left elbow on 18th April in a Crystal Tournament match against EVO’s Soy. The show started with Sera talking about her recent ACL/MCL injuries on the WAVE show on 13th July, but Sera wanted to continue for the fans. Well, Sera’s knee is definitely messed up. She was hobbling and barely putting any weight on it. I have no idea how she intends on finishing this retirement run. So of course, Natsumi worked over Sera’s knee. Sera could not even get Irish whipped into the corner.

Miran tagged in for her 3rd match of 2025, and for a 16-year-old, she is very good. She immediately tried to pin Nanami with a Frankensteiner and later caught her in a flying octopus hold. Umesaki and Amikura had a great 5 minute back and forth, trading stiff chops and side suplexes. Diana’s future was on display in this match. Sera tagged back in and Natsumi once again worked over the knee. The more I thought about this match, the more I realised that Sera’s injured knee really added to the match rather than subtracted from it. They were smart in incorporating it into the story of the match and built to the finish of Sera being a big underdog, as the home crowd willed her to the finish line in a series of nearfalls. It ended up being a very fun match that will be quite memorable just for Sera’s performance on one leg in her hometown, and when she wasn’t in the match, the future of Diana went hard.

After the match, Sera announced a new promotion based in Sera, Hiroshima, called “Wrestle Bingo”. It is a joint venture between Diana and Prominence, with Diana teasing it as far back as March 2024 when they were last in Sera.

© Diana

Caffeine and Crush (Ayako Sato & Debbie Keitel) took on Taiwanese wrestler Syan Syan and Unagi Sayaka. Unagi was booed out of the building because she overslept and was late, causing a change in the match order. Sera and Kyoko Inoue had already primed the audience to boo her when she arrived. The crowd chanted “Late!” at Unagi (in Japanese, obviously). Caffeine and Crush were due to fight for the Diana Tag Team Championship a week later, so as expected, they picked up the win in what was a pretty good match (although not must-see viewing). Syan has potential and would love to see her more often in Diana. Syan, 20, is basically a rookie with just over 1 year experience. She moves really well for a rookie and seems to have a knack for wrestling. Syan idolises Sendai Girls’ Chihiro Hashimoto and trained with her a few weeks prior.

Mizuki Kato teamed with Sae to take on the regular Diana legend tag team of Kyoko Inoue and Jaguar Yokota in a fun legends match. Sae is normally booked in Nagoya with Sportiva and in Kobe with Meriken. This was her third Diana appearance in 2025.

Another Hiroshima native, Yuko Miyamoto, teamed with Prominence’s Kurumi Hiragi to take on former BJW Junior Heavyweight Champion Ikuto Hidaka and Maika Ozaki. Hidaka runs Shawn Capture with Itsuki Aoki based out of the Shimane prefecture, which neighbours Hiroshima. This was a good match, especially the finishing stretches between Hiragi and Ozaki. Hiragi lariated Ozaki out of her boots and hit a diving splash for the win.

In the opener, Himiko faced Maika Ozaki’s tag team partner, Tae Honma. Honma is retiring in October, this was her last match in Hiroshima and last singles match against Himiko.

Full Results

Tae Honma defeats Himiko (12:32)

Kurumi Hiragi & Yuko Miyamoto defeat Ikuto Hidaka & Maika Ozaki (15:40)

Jaguar Yokota & Kyoko Inoue defeat Mizuki Kato & Sae (11:24)

Ayako Sato & Debbie Keitel defeat Syan Syan & Unagi Sayaka (17:29)

Haruka Umesaki, Miran & Risa Sera defeat Mochi Natsumi, Nanami Hatano & Rina Amikura (17:29)

© @cthemoon

Vol. 90

13th July 2025
Post di Amistad, Kawasaki, Japan
Watch On: Diana Live

Vol. 90 on 13th July at Post di Amistad, Kawasaki, was headlined by Debbie Keitel & Jaguar Yokota versus Himiko & Kyoko Inoue. Himiko has 3 years of experience and is 3 years younger than Kyoko who has 36 years of experience. The total age of this main event was over 200 years. Though in contrast to Kyoko, Himiko moves pretty well without the wear and tear of several decades of bumping. Yokota slapping the ref in the face was fun. At one point Himiko forgot to bump a DDT so Yokota dragged her to the ground forcefully. It’s amazing Yokota is even still going – she debuted in 1977.

Ayako Sato faced Taiwanese wrestler Syan Syan, who was making her 10th Diana appearance in 2025. Miyako Matsumoto teamed up with one half of the Diana Tag Team Champions, Nanami, after losing to her in a singles match the last time she appeared in Diana. They took on SPiCEAP (Maika Ozaki & Tae Honma) who are the WAVE Tag Team Champions. Nanami and Honma were good together. They pledged a rematch, so there might be a tag title match between SPiCEAP and Nijumaru (Nanami & Rina Amikura). Marika Kobashi fought Mizuki Kato in the opener. Marika left TJPW in 2022 to become a freelancer who works in very small promotions. This was her Diana debut. Kato should consider making the dropkick her finisher, it looks brutal.

Trainee Anna finished her second test. She’s from Aichi in Nagoya so the first test was held at their Nagoya show on 25th May, which Anna did not pass. She did exercises as well as sparring with Miran, who returned on 20th July in Sera. Anna did not pass once again on this show. Jaguar Yokota and Kyoko Inoue gave her feedback, saying that it did not appear that she wanted it bad enough, they couldn’t see the emotion or desire to push through the pain. Yokota said she had not seen much improvement from Nagoya. Kyoko reminded her she moved all the way from Nagoya to live in a dorm in Kawasaki and so she has to try her best. Kyoko encouraged Anna to not start tomorrow, but today, by doing 100 squats or situps before bed. Kyoko told Anna she was planning on debuting her at Korakuen Hall in October, but that she isn’t ready yet. Joshi training is tough.

Full Results

Marika Kobashi defeats Mizuki Kato (8:40)

SPiCEAP (Maika Ozaki & Tae Honma) defeat Miyako Matsumoto & Nanami Hatano (15:07)

Ayako Sato defeats Syan Syan (12:09)

Himiko & Kyoko Inoue defeat Debbie Keitel & Jaguar Yokota (14:11)

© @cthemoon

Vol. 91

27th July 2025
Post di Amistad, Kawasaki, Japan
Watch On: Diana Live

Diana held the 91th installment of their regular Amistad show, with a main event of a Diana Tag Team Title match between defending champions Nijumara (Nanami Hatano & Rina Amikura) and challengers Caffeine and Crush (Ayako Sato & Debbie Keitel). This match was great and one of Diana’s best matches of 2025 (the other one also involving Ayako Sato is not a coincidence).

Both teams kept up the pace from the start, with no dull periods; it was all go for the entire duration of the match. There was also an attention to detail you only see in the best of tag matches. An example of this was Nanami locking on a rear naked choke on Keitel. Sato immediately jumped into the ring to help out Keitel, who was in utter panic, so Amikura sprinted into the ring to protect Nanami. It’s not Nanami’s finisher, yet Keitel was selling it so well that you could be forgiven for thinking it was the finish. This happened every time there was a submission hold on, letting you know how important the titles were to the teams. In addition to those details, the action itself was just awesome, with heavy chops, double teams and, my favourite, German suplexes. The finish was awesome. Sato was about to blast them with her metal lid, but Keitel stopped her, saying “you’re the best, you don’t need it,” from Keitel of all people. It was cute to see how Keitel views her tag team partner and has utter disgust for literally everyone else. Keitel then threw Nanami out and Sato hit a great bridging dragon suplex on Amikura to capture the titles. Honestly, this match ruled.

In the semi-main event, the newly crowned Crystal Champion, Mizuki Kato, teamed with Jaguar Yokota to take on Maika Ozaki and Yuko Sakurai. Kato is slowly improving as she injects more speed and energy into her moves so they look much more impactful, especially her dropkick which hits like a truck. How much Yokota does in these matches still shocks me, days before her 49th anniversary show. Ozaki delivered a top rope side suplex to Yokota. Yokota picked up the win with a clutch pin on Sakurai.

© @cthemoon

Haruka Umesaki and Syan Syan clashed with Kuumu and Yappy following the events of “Future Sight #36”. Kuumu, Syan Syan’s Taiwanese compatriot, debuted in Diana and beat Syan Syan up alongside her new Invader or Innovator stablemates, leader Ayako Sato, Keitel and Himiko. Yappy is part of Ice Ribbon’s Bad Butts faction. Kuumu debuted on 14th June of this year in Taiwanese promotion New Taiwan Entertainment Wrestling (NTW) which is Syan Syan’s home promotion. From the early stages of the match, it was clear that Kuumu was much more green than Syan Syan, which makes sense considering she debuted a year later. Haruka and Syan Syan were hot out of the gates and wrestled with intensity following their beat down the night before. Syan Syan has a great Muta lock which Kuumu had the displeasure of experiencing. Umesaki won with the Ume Press on Kuumu.

Shortly before the show, the tag match between Himiko & Miran and Kaori Yoneyama & Kyoko Inoue was changed as Miran was pulled from the card, so the remaining participants competed in a three-way. It was exactly what you’d expect.

Full Results

Haruka Umesaki and Syan Syan defeat Kuumu and Yappy (10:12)

Himiko defeats Kaori Yoneyama and Kyoko Inoue (7:49)

Jaguar Yokota and Mizuki Kato defeat Maika Ozaki and Yuko Sakurai (12:48)

Caffeine and Crush (Ayako Sato & Debbie Keitel) defeat Nijumaru (Nanami Hatano & Rina Amikura) (19:32)

© WAVE

Diana House Show Notes

On 26th July, Diana held the 36th installment in their “Future Sight” series which focuses on putting a spotlight on the younger or less experienced wrestlers, the latter being the exception for wrestlers like Himiko. In the main event, Honoka successfully defended her Diana Crystal Championship against Mizuki Kato. The match was heating up but had to be stopped early when Kato did her running seated senton right onto Honoka’s ribs. Kato is a big wrestler, and she must’ve landed too hard without cushioning the impact. Honoka could not get back up, which is when the ref checked on her and stopped the match. Kato won the title due to this and looked miserable. WAVE later announced Honoka had suffered a fractured sternum and would be out of action for a while.

In the semi-main event, Syan Syan, 20, teamed up with Himiko, 53, with 5 years of experience between them, to take on Miran, 16, and Nanami, 18, with 8 years of experience between the young pair. Miran returned from injury on 20th July and Syan Syan is racking up the appearances during her summer break from university in Taiwan. I was enjoying this match until the finish, you could hear the reverberations of Syan Syan and Miran forearming each other in the chest. It was ruled a “no contest” in order to debut a new faction. Syan Syan was beaten up outside the ring in order by “Invader or Innovator” stable, led by Ayako Sato, Debbie Keitel, Himiko & now a new member from Taiwan, Kuumu. Umesaki came out for the save.

PURE-J’s AKARI went to a time-limit draw with Debbie Keitel in a solid match, which focused on grappling early on. In the opener Honori Hana took on Haruka Umesaki, with Honori pulling double duty as she had just teamed up with Miria Koga against Stardom’s H.A.T.E. in the morning in SEAdLINNNG. I hadn’t watched that show yet, so seeing Honori here spoiled the fact that H.A.T.E. did not in fact murder her. This match was fine, and grew in intensity. Umesaki rolled up Honori and they brawled after the bell, perhaps setting up a future match.

Diana News & Upcoming Shows

Umesaki made an appearance in LLPW-X on 4th July and PURE-J on 6th July. In PURE-J, she teamed with one of their stars, Crea, to take on the masked wrestlers, Honoka and Leon. It was fun seeing her work with Leon, and it was a really good match, but it’s not a match you need to go out of your way to see if you’re an Umesaki fan, as she wasn’t involved much.

Diana will be hosting volumes 92 and 93 on 9th and 10th of August, respectively. The cards will be announced in the week prior.

© WAVE

Pro Wrestling WAVE
Osaka Rhapsody Vol. 65 ~ ZEN & Vol. 66 ~ KOU

13th July 2025 Afternoon & Evening Show
Company Announced Attendance: 198 & 235
176BOX, Osaka, Japan
Watch On: Confetti Web

Hazuki, Risa Sera & SAKI took on Rina Amikura, Yuki Miyazaki & Yuko Sakurai on the undercard. I had seen that Risa Sera announced ACL and MCL injuries, but did not know where it happened, so I was surprised when the match was called and everyone rushed in to check on Sera. It happened when Sera was trying to give Miyazaki, who is quite large, a Michinoku Driver. Sera buckled, while still making sure Miyazaki landed safely. They took off her leg gear and carried her out on a table, which was used as a makeshift stretcher.

In the first group decider for the Venus block, Diana’s Haruka Umesaki, Kaho Kobayashi and Natsu Sumire faced each other in a three-way. This match wasn’t good. Well, it depends on your enjoyment of Natsu. At least this time there was a ref bump to allow Natsu to use her whip rather than right in front of him. However, I did pump my fists at the finish as Haruka picked up the win with a double La Magistral on Kaho and Natsu, eliminating them both. Haruka advanced to the evening show. Momoka Hanazono, Unagi Sayaka and Yumi Ohka in a three-way for the Mars block closed out the afternoon show. Momoka won with a rollup on Sayaka.

© WAVE

Both matches had the correct person going through for a higher quality evening show. However, all wrestlers on this afternoon show were clearly working very lightly because of there being two shows in one day, so the show should not have been full-priced – it’s quite off putting in wanting to support the smaller companies. This show was the same price as AEW “All In”. I could’ve bought a 6 piece Bargain Bucket from KFC instead of this show. According to the Woodland Trust, I could’ve donated the same cost of this show to plant enough trees to capture 0.8 tonnes of carbon. Social Suplex Newsletter, checking out sub-par $25 WAVE shows so you don’t have to buy them (or search high and low for them in the deepest corners of the internet. To be clear, for this show, don’t even do that).

On the evening show, even though Risa was on the card, she did not do much. She would later post on Twitter that she’d continue to wrestle on her retirement road despite the ACL and MCL injuries. Despite my earlier comments about the wrestlers saving something, the undercard on the evening show was just as bad. I can’t believe there was a 20 minute nothing-happening six-man just to fill time. Just do one show!

The last three-ways to decide which 3 would go onto the final on 21st July were:

The last match listed there seemed surprising at first, but it wasn’t. Hazuki was a believable winner of the tournament until she was announced for Stardom’s Sapporo PPV days before the VOD for this show was released. The Sapporo show was scheduled on the same day as WAVE’s finals at Korakuen Hall show in Tokyo.

© WAVE

The rules for the final three-ways (and the final at Korakuen) were that two would start in the ring. After a wrestler got pinned or submitted, they would be replaced. The first wrestler to score two pinfalls in a row wins the match, with no time-limit. A lottery would decide who starts. In the first three-way, Momoka and Ranna started off the bout. After delivering some stiff kicks to Momoka’s back, Momoka started crying and needed consolation from Ranna. Momoka poked her in the eyes and then rolled her up for her first fall. Moments later, YuuRI caught Momoka out with a rollup to win her first fall and reset Momoka. The next fall between Ranna and YuuRI was not good, including botching the pin at the end that looked very awkward. YuuRI clearly didn’t know what pin Ranna wanted to do and Ranna couldn’t force YuuRI into it, as it was one of those creative pins that needed cooperation. Momoka was back in the match and once again started crying after Ranna’s stiff kicks. Ranna did not care this time and pelted her in the back. Ranna and Momoka traded at least 20 back and forth pins in a row. Momoka slammed Ranna with a German suplex, causing Ranna to cry. (Editor’s Note: Ranna is just like me for real.) Momoka had to check up on Ranna only to get poked in the eyes herself, but she survived the nearfall. Ranna then kicked her in the head for the 3 count and scored the second consecutive pinfall to win the match.

In the next three-way, SAKI won the first pinfall against Haruka almost immediately with a running brainbuster. Aoki then pinned SAKI with her signature running lariat. Aoki and Haruka had a pretty good match in the 3rd fall. It was hard hitting and Haruka sold her exhaustion well. She needed to win to prevent Aoki winning the match, and you could sense her desperation as Aoki peppered her with lariats, buzzsaw kicks and a German suplex. Eventually Haruka found a way, pinning Aoki with La Magistral. Haruka continued to struggle through the next fall as SAKI sought to make her submit in several holds. As the match spilled to the outside, Haruka found an opening, pushing through SAKI’s resistance and dropping her with a body slam before landing a diving crossbody from the top rope. Haruka’s heroic efforts paid off as she snuck the win by rolling SAKI up during a running brainbuster attempt, winning the match by pinning Aoki and SAKI back-to-back.

I suppose one advantage of stacking one of the three-ways is that you’re guaranteed a good match and in fact, this main event was excellent and the best match of the tournament so far. Kohaku controlled the match out of the gate, putting the veteran Hazuki into a painful Boston Crab. Hazuki tried to gain a foothold with her facewash but Kohaku interrupted her with a dropkick mid-sprint. All it took was one move to reverse the momentum as Hazuki used her instincts to catch Kohaku with an apron DDT on the outside of the ring.

© WAVE

Hazuki was relentless from there on out, placing Kohaku on the top of the turnbuckle for a top-rope codebreaker. She quickly followed up with her diving senton for her first pinfall. One thing I love about WAVE is that it’s one of the few companies which allow us to see match ups like Sasamura and Hazuki. Sasamura took a few minutes to get heated up, hitting Hazuki with a dragon screw and targeting Hazuki’s right leg. Hazuki tried to fight back, countering Sasamura’s suplex attempts. It was effective for a moment, until she was caught in a deep backslide pin, giving Sasamura the first pinfall she needed.

© WAVE

It didn’t last long, as Kohaku quickly pinned Sasamura before being pinned by Hazuki once again. Hazuki just needed to pin Sasamura. Sasamura vaulted back in and assaulted Hazuki with a barrage of suplexes and a Cutie Special, all not enough to put Hazuki away. Sasamura took Hazuki’s head off with a lariat and sat on Hazuki with all her weight, resetting Hazuki and putting Sasamura in the driving seat.

The match’s pace accelerated quickly. Kohaku replaced Hazuki and launched at Sasamura with a missile dropkick. Sasamura’s fighting spirit gave her enough power to launch Kohaku up and land a Cutie Special. The fighting spirit appeared to eventually run out and exhaust Sasamura, making her vulnerable to Kohaku’s 120% Schoolboy, losing the fall.

© WAVE

Around we go, with Hazuki back in, and she exchanged a lot of near fall pins with Kohaku – they had done well to build the match such that you could believe any roll-up could finish the match especially as each wrestler became more tired. Kohaku hit a thudding headbutt on Hazuki, and then forearmed her in the back of the head. The match descended into a fierce forearm exchange, with both refusing to back down. Hazuki gained the upper hand, landing a German suplex on Kohaku before following up with a superplex. Sensing the end, Hazuki hit her diving senton and thought the match was over, but Kohaku kicked out just in time. Kohaku came back with a sequence of sharp knees, then dropped Hazuki with a jumping sitout pedigree. With momentum on her side, she caught Hazuki in the 120% Schoolboy and held on for the three-count. This is one of those matches that I feel was hurt by a tired Osaka crowd, and in a Shinjuku FACE or Korakuen Hall it would’ve been one of my top matches of the independent scene in 2025.

So, your Catch the WAVE 2025 finalists – Kohaku, Haruka Umesaki and Ranna Yagami. I’m happy that WAVE chose to highlight Ranna and Haruka. Haruka isn’t inexperienced anymore; she’s a very good wrestler but her development has stalled when people expected her to be the next big thing. She is still the ace of Diana, but not as much of a star as people may have expected. This run was a nice reminder of her ability. In our last issue we identified Kohaku as an odds-on favourite to win. That was made even more obvious with this trio, so let’s move onto our Korakuen Hall recap and the inevitable crowning of Kohaku as the new “Nami Onna” or “Wave Queen”, and the 16th in total.

Full Results Afternoon Show

Honoka & Saran defeat Asuka Goda & Ranna Yagami (10:51)

Cherry defeats Itsuki Aoki and Kakeru Sekiguchi and Kohaku (11:31)

Rina Amikura, Yuki Miyazaki & Yuko Sakurai defeat Hazuki, Risa Sera & SAKI by referee’s decision (15:37)

Catch The Wave 2025 Venus Block Three Way Elimination:
aruka Umesaki defeats Kaho Kobayashi and Natsu Sumire (11:19)

Catch The Wave 2025 Mars Block Three Way Elimination:
Momoka Hanazono defeats Unagi Sayaka and Yumi Ohka (15:27)

Full Results Evening Show

Cherry & Kaori Yoneyama defeat Asuka Goda & Kakeru Sekiguchi (9:39)

Kaho Kobayashi & Natsu Sumire defeat Honoka & Saran (12:51)

Rina Amikura, Yuki Miyazaki & Yuko Sakurai defeat Risa Sera, Unagi Sayaka & Yumi Ohka (20:36)

Catch The Wave 2025 Three Way:
Ranna Yagami [Saturn Block] defeats Momoka Hanazono [Mars Block] and YuuRI [Neptune Block] (15:47)

Catch The Wave 2025 Three Way:
Haruka Umesaki [Venus Block] defeats Itsuki Aoki [Uranus Block] and SAKI [Jupiter Block] (21:56)
Catch The Wave 2025 Three Way:
Kohaku [Earth Block] defeats Ayame Sasamura [Pluto Block] and Hazuki [Mercury Block] (27:34)

© WAVE

Catch The WAVE 2025 Final

21/07/2025
Company Announced Attendance: 548
Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Confetti Web

The big one. The last two and a half months have culminated in this show: the final of the Catch the WAVE 2025 tournament. To be fair, the joy of WAVE’s annual tournament is not actually the final, but the novelty in seeing the cross-promotional matchups, as well as trying to figure out who may progress and the stakes involved in elimination matches with intense 15 minute draws looming over both wrestlers’ heads. The final show was not even the strongest overall show of the last few months, but it was capped off by a solid tag team title match and a great main event.

This was the first of WAVE’s two Korakuen Hall shows within a 3 week period, with the subsequent one scheduled for 10th August on their anniversary. They needed something big considering how quickly they followed each other. As expected, for the 10th August they have gone to the Kohaku versus Saya Kamitani rematch for the Regina Di WAVE Title as Kohaku is your Catch the WAVE 2025 tournament winner.

This is exceedingly straightforward and not much analysis is required here. I would be incredibly shocked if they did not pull the trigger on Kohaku as she has challenged for it four times and lost every time, including once already to Saya Kamitani. Kohaku is already their ace in practice – but to cement that, she needs a title reign.

You could question why they did not give Kohaku a stronger final to seed some doubt in her crowning, but it is analogous to Hangman vs. Mox or Cody vs. Roman II where you knew who was winning and you were just there for the moment and to see how it would happen (ignoring the difference in scale).

Kohaku was crowned “Nami Onna”, or “Wave Queen”, in an excellent final between three great young wrestlers: the ace of Diana, Haruka Umesaki, the ace of WAVE, Kohaku and Stardom’s Ranna Yagami with only 1.5 years under her belt. The match began with a good singles match in its own right between Haruka and Ranna. The first match was even between the two, and so, in true WAVE fashion, had to be ended with a creative pin, as Ranna pinned Haruka with her Paradiddle pin (a reference to her drumming skills). Despite being tired, Ranna held on for several minutes against Kohaku before succumbing to her diving splash. Haruka then reset Kohaku with a La Magistral. Ranna was back in and tried to pin Haruka again with Paradiddle, but as on the last show with YuuRI, she struggled to put it on and had to go for a normal pin before transitioning into an armbar to tap out Haruka.

Ranna took a sip of water to prepare for this fall. She had WAVE’s ace, Kohaku, in the way if she wanted to become the 16th Nami Onna. Ranna had an entire Stardom 5Star Grand Prix ahead of her, with battles against the likes of Sareee. This would give her a great boost of confidence going into the proverbial meat grinder. Kohaku, knowing how tired Ranna must be by now with the extra 7 minutes accrued in the first fall, ran at Ranna, throwing her to the outside and attempted a diving crossbody to the outside. Ranna, although physically tired, leapt out of the way and found the gap in the armor she was looking for. Each time Kohaku would try to come back, Ranna would knock her down with a kick. Ranna would eventually make a mistake by trying her own crossbody, allowing Kohaku to obtain a more even footing in the match leading to Ranna’s eventual loss by a 120% Schoolboy pin.

© WAVE

There was a fierce intensity in the next fall between Kohaku and Haruka. Stiff strikes, decapitating dropkicks and big knee strikes. This change of pace was great. After exchanging La Magistral attempts, Haruka nailed Kohaku with a Cutie Special before hitting the Ume Press (rotating diving splash) for a 2 count. The crowd, which had been quiet all night, started yelling Kohaku’s name. They could feel it was close. Haruka’s striking is one of her underrated abilities, as she blasted Kohaku with a loud forearm before delivering a German suplex, dropping Kohaku on her neck for another nearfall. Kohaku gave Haruka a receipt with her own forearm into a knee strike. Haruka fired up, fighting through the pain to try and hold Kohaku in a cradle for a nearfall. Kohaku decided to bring out the big guns, spiking Haruka first with a modified reverse DDT, and then with a double underhook DDT for the win.

In the semi-main event, SPiCEAP (Maika Ozaki & Tae Honma) clashed with Unagi Sayaka & Yuki Miyazaki. Honma is retiring on 13th October at Shinjuku FACE, while Miyazaki is retiring on 1st January at Korakuen Hall. The match started off light-hearted as Unagi initially refused to tag in Miyazaki, but when Miyazaki jumped in front of a dropkick to save her, Unagi was touched and softened up. Miyazaki went to war with Ozaki in a prolonged battle of lariats, with the crowd getting behind Miyazaki. After the battle transitioned to shoulder tackles, Miyazaki eventually downed Ozaki to large cheers. I am not exaggerating when I say that this lariat/shoulder-tackle battle lasted just over 5 minutes. Following this, Miyazaki climbed the ropes to deliver her insane moonsault (she is quite big, and 46 years old), but Ozaki kicked out at 1. In the closing stages, Honma saved Ozaki from being pinned by Miyazaki’s Death Valley Driver. Miyazaki then hit a second and tried to go for the pin but Ozaki rolled it into her own pin to retain the title.

© WAVE

The undercard was not very strong, but that has been the common theme in a lot of the shows throughout the tournament period. They’re mostly filler, the wrestlers are having fun, but there’s no stakes and rarely any hard hitting action. The first two matches did not waste my time and so they were fine. The tag team elimination rumble was a bit more of a slog taken up by uninteresting action while wrestlers made their entrance. Also, the match had Natsu Sumire. There are only two things I genuinely bury in the Japanese Independent section, and those are WAVE undercards and Natsu. This had both. Okay three, sometimes I bury Nagayo’s booking of men’s matches. This match had Hanazono blow a party popper into Natsu’s crotch. She then dropped on Hanazono’s face, Danshoku Dino style, but was humping Hanazono’s face, eliminating her. I just can’t do it. I dislike it largely because it’s so immersion-breaking. I can actually believe Dino loves his co-workers and wants to lovingly hump them. There’s no point at which his character breaks. If you’re doing a gimmick like that, you have to really commit to it, try to actually play your character. Natsu does it half-heartedly, she knows it’s a gimmick that’s over and she’ll just play the greatest hits, not bothering to be creative with it, ever. I’ve seen Dino have several different types of matches. It’s not the gimmick I hate, it’s Natsu’s execution of it (or lack thereof). Anyway, it is what it is, it’s not what you watch WAVE for.

Ending coverage of the tournament on a positive note, I really enjoyed following the tournament this year. There were some excellent matches (mostly all involving Hazuki, indicating what a high-level worker she is). I felt they selected the final participants excellently. Most importantly, the right person won – so in the bigger picture, I could not have asked for more. Now WAVE needs to follow through, it’s time to run with the fox, Kohaku.

Full Results

Mizuki Kato defeats Asuka Goda (4:44)

Ayame Sasamura, Itsuki Aoki & Kakeru Sekiguchi defeat Mari Manji, Rina Amikura & Yuko Sakurai (12:04)

Gauntlet:
Cherry & Kaori Yoneyama vs. Honoka & Saran vs. Kaho Kobayashi & Nanami Hatano vs. Marika Kobashi & Momoka Hanazono vs. Mio Shirai & Yumi Ohka vs. Natsu Sumire & YuuRI vs. Risa Sera & SAKI

WAVE Tag Team Title:
SPiCEAP (Maika Ozaki & Tae Honma) (c) defeat Unagi Sayaka & Yuki Miyazaki (20:02)

Catch The Wave 2025 Final Three Way:
Kohaku defeats Haruka Umesaki and Ranna Yagami (26:19)

WAVE News & Upcoming Shows

WAVE announced Honoka had suffered a fractured sternum in Diana on 26th July and would be out of action for a while. She was due to challenge SPiCEAP (Maika Ozaki & Tae Honma) with Saran for the WAVE Tag Team Title on 1st August in Shinjuku FACE; instead, Diana’s Mizuki Kato will take Honoka’s place. Stardom’s Koguma will also wrestle on the show. Asuka Goda will be absent for a while as she is recuperating from a flare-up from a chronic condition.

It’s non-stop for WAVE, as straight after their annual tournament they will celebrate their 18th anniversary at Korakuen Hall on 10th August. Saya Kamitani defends her Regina Di WAVE title against the Wave Queen, Kohaku, in what will surely be a title change. Jun Kasai returns to WAVE for the first time since 2023 to face Yuki Miyazaki in a Fluorescent Light Tubes Death Match. Saran celebrates her 4th anniversary by teaming with Hot Shushu’s Arisa Shinose to face the JTO Girls Tag Team Champions and Ice Ribbon regulars, Misa Kagura & Sumika Yanagawa. The former all-GAEA pair of Chikayo Nagashima & Sonoko Kato team up and were due to take on Honoka & Yumi Ohka, but Honoka has been replaced with Mio Shirai.

© Battle News

Actwres girl’Z
ACTwrestling Step 59

11th July 2025
Shin-Kiba 1st RING, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Actwres girl’Z App

I feel that I got into AWG at exactly the right time. The “Step” shows have been great, with at least three or four out of the five matches on each show being really good. The rookies seem to have started their launch to stardom, as Anri and Yukina have kicked off a rivalry with an amazing singles match against each other on 28th June. The ACT Game tournament has produced great tag matches in every round. The Korakuen Hall show is around the corner on 13th August and includes Natsupoi and Saori Anou’s return to the promotion. On top of all that, “Step 59” continued the streak of good shows.

“Step 59” hosted yet another ACT Game main event, this time a blockbuster match between Amaterasu (Act & Mari) against Midsummer Sea Breeze (Nagisa Shiotsuki & Natsuki). Act & Mari play a significant role in the company as one of their top two stars, as well as Mari being the head trainer. If we were doing power rankings going into this tournament, it would’ve been hard to rank the four top teams: Amaterasu, Midsummer Sea Breeze, MRC (Marino Saihara & Riko Fukunaga) and Sakuramochi (Naru & Sakura Mizushima). Amaterasu are the top heels in the company, and this is their debut in the tournament, so I was really curious to see how hard they would go against Natsuki. Act and Nagisa had a match almost 6 weeks ago that wasn’t a standout, but it stuck in my mind how badly Nagisa bloodied Act’s chest with her chops, so I was looking forward to seeing Nagisa’s performance in this match, too.

© AWG

The match started off in typical Killer’Z fashion, refusing the handshakes of the babyface team and ambushing them. The first heavy shot of the match was Natsuki blasting Act in the back with a vicious kick, before taking in Nagisa. Nagisa’s movement is not as fluid as others, but we again saw her start chopping Act, which must have given Act some PTSD. This fight had Natsuki and Nagisa control the flow of the early stages, with Act and Mari on the backfoot. Mari switched up the momentum as she countered Natsuki’s Cutie Special into a lifting reverse DDT. Mari fired up after a superplex and caught Natsuki with a jumping high kick, forcing Natsuki to roll out of the ring and take a breather. This was a smart moment as it was a clear bookmark in the match, jacking up the intensity as they slowly walked back towards each other. They began throwing forearms at each other before Mari downed Natsuki by following through with a forceful elbow. Nagisa had to break up the pin after Natsuki was knocked down from Mari’s question mark kick. Natsuki recovered and got a nearfall with the Cutie Special before nailing Mari with her own high kick. Mari assaulted Natsuki with a barrage of kicks before delivering the Abyss Drop finisher to win the match. The ending minutes of the match between Mari and Natsuki were well done, although overall it was not my match of the night. Act disappeared after taking chops from Nagisa early on, so she wasn’t up for taking punishment on this show.

© Battle News

In the semi-main event, the AWG Champion Marino Saihara and the KING Of Ring Entertainment Champion Sakura Mizushima, took on the rookie duo of Anri & Yukina Uehara. In our last issue, we reviewed the singles match between Anri & Yukina. On reflection, I did not praise it enough. It is the best match I’ve reviewed so far as part of our AWG column and one of my favourites of 2025, full-stop. A perfect, 7 minute rookie match, and Yukina made me eat my words about her from issue 7. So of course, I am now very excited for every match involving these two, to see how they progress.

I really liked this match, and when you see the participants, you’d think it’s because of Sakura or Marino, but it was entirely Anri. I couldn’t stop focusing on what she was doing, I barely noticed Sakura or Marino. It’s hard to believe Anri is a rookie. That isn’t to overhype her and say she’s one of the best wrestlers around, because she isn’t. One of my factors for a wrestler’s skill is how often I’m reminded that what I’m watching isn’t actually a real competition. The suspension of disbelief. If someone can make me believe what I’m watching is really a fight for the win, I tend to hold those wrestlers in the highest regard. That’s by facial expressions, movement, selling, realistic looking offence, and so on. Anri, for her experience level, shouldn’t be able to convey those things, but she does. Again, it’s not at a level where it’s world class, but in her bracket, it is outstanding. Yukina on the other hand, although she had an incredible performance with Anri on “Step 58”, her selling is still not good. There are several moments where I am taken out of the match due to both how she sells and her awkwardness in tag team matches. By far the best thing she does is when she tries to kick someone’s chest in with a smile on her face. Anri is the real deal, though, and as I mentioned in the last issue, a solid contender for Rookie of the Year along with Senka Akatsuki (Marvelous), Homare (Dragongate) and Daiki Odashima (NOAH). I think Anri has now overtaken Daiki.

© Battle News

Anri has some flashy moves (like the Christo submission shown above), but overall it’s not her moves that wow me – it’s the little things. While getting beat up by Sakura, Anri tried to turn the situation on its head by lighting up Sakura with stiff kicks. It wasn’t successful, but they showed the viewer that she isn’t just going to sit there and take it, and it didn’t matter that she was against one of AWG’s two champions, either. She also attempted to cave in Marino’s chest with forearms later in the match. Anri has a great babyface fire, too, with good selling, so she’s solid not just on offense, but also defense. Yukina’s best sequence of the match was when she kicked Sakura while smiling, a repeat of the spot she did to Anri on the last show. However, later on she took a Killswitch from Sakura that did not look great, pointing to her needing to work on her selling. The match was over when Anri was caught in an armbar by Marino, after trying to rip off Sakura’s arm herself earlier. Anri really got Marino’s armbar over by screaming like hell. Really good stuff, and my match of the night. After the match, Yukina challenged Sakura for the KING Of Ring Entertainment Championship, which took place in Yokohama on 26th July.

AWG has become my second favourite promotion to watch in 2025, along with Marvelous and DDT, and I think Anri & Yukina’s development for the last 6 months of 2025 will make sure that continues. I’d like to shoutout the “Actwres Stage” podcast and its hosts Sondre and Velkej Bracha as one of the few English-speaking content creators covering the promotion, as they make the promotion very accessible and help fill in any context gaps.

Marino and Saihara are the red and green colours of the babyface Actwres-5 faction. Each member of the faction has their own colours. Riko Fukunaga is blue and Naru is pink. The 5th member of the faction, Yui Tensho, is yellow and had not wrestled since the 16th March Korakuen Hall show, but she made her return, teaming with Riko to take on Chii Aoba and Naru. Riko recently beat Chii in singles action on 28th in a one-sided match, so this tag served to provide Chii with a much needed boost in the back and forth. Riko and Chii are also due to face each other in GLEAT in a “UWF Rules” match on 9th August. Chi executed some good moves on Riko, including a hip-toss into a Kesa-gatame, and later, a bridging full Nelson hold that was locked in on Yui. Naru, who clashed with Riko in a losing effort in the ACT Game tournament on 22nd June, continued to prove she is the best seller in AWG with another consistent performance.

© Battle News

Part of the story of this match was Tensho’s rustiness, as she mistimed a double move causing Riko to drop onto the mat. In reality, she looked fine, but no action jumped out of the page. Chii picked up the win with the diving body press. After the match, there was some comedic back and forth between Riko and Yui. Riko was upset that Yui has been away for so long just posting Ramen pics on social media. While the rest of Actwres-5 attempted to hold Riko back, Riko was telling Yui that she needed to work harder to stay in Actwres-5 as there were a lot of hungry rookies wanting to join. Actwres-5 leader, Marino, told Yui that she hadn’t wrestled for 4 months and just lost to an Asako Army member, so she should do some reflecting. Yui said that she’d train harder.

Elsewhere, Rio continued her quest to try and get accepted into Killer’Z by MARU, this time in a singles match. Rio is a 6-month rookie who has impressed me so far. I think she has a lot of potential if wrestling is something she decides to fully commit herself to. I have taken a liking to her matches, and this one was no different. This match felt like a real struggle, in a good way. They were able to effectively convey Rio’s desire to overcome MARU and this was not a stroll in the park for MARU like most 6-month rookies might be. MARU was great at getting Rio over as a problem that couldn’t be easily swatted away. MARU picked up the win after struggling and eventually succeeding to put Rio in a stretch muffler hold.

Full Results

Ayano Irie defeats Erisa Nagai (8:06)

Chii Aoba & Naru defeat Riko Fukunaga & Yui Tensho (13:43)

MARU defeats Rio (7:11)

Marino Saihara & Sakura Mizushima defeat Anri & Yukina Uehara (13:15)

ACT Game Second Round Point Tag Team:
Act & Mari defeat Nagisa Shiotsuki & Natsuki (16:38)

© Battle News

ACTwrestling Step 60

18th July 2025
Shin-Kiba 1st RING, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Actwres girl’Z App

“Step 60” had to follow in the difficult footsteps of 56, 57 and 59, and to be honest, it was also really good. It’s perhaps time to stop singling out the good “Step” shows and accepting that AWG is just putting out consistently good shows on the road to Korakuen Hall on 13th August. In the main event the AWG Champion Marino Saihara defended against Nene Arahata, a match which was set up following a tag on 28th June. Nene had some decent heel work, such as choking Marino with a Marino banner that was hanging on the side of the arena. Marino won with the MRN Smash (bridging German suplex) for her 3rd defence in a solid match. After the show Marino said that if she makes the ACT Game final with MRC, she’d prefer to go for the AWG Tag Team Championships at Korakuen Hall rather than defend her AWG Championship, but she isn’t rejecting the idea of wrestling twice in one night. She is motivated by becoming a double champion.

Amaterasu took on Polaris in an ACT Game Tournament match for a spot in the finals at Korakuen Hall on 13th August. Anri started off grappling with Mari, and I loved every second of it, even though it only lasted a minute. They tagged in Act and Erisa. It’s not that Act and Erisa did anything bad, but all I wanted when watching them was for them to tag Mari and Anri back in. I soon got my wish and Anri quickly locked in her flying Octopus hold, forcing Mari to the ropes. Mari held Anri by the hand, using it as extra leverage to blast Anri with kicks to the chest. Anri got Mari into a single leg boston crab and held onto that leg with her dear life, screaming with determination. Have I said how good Anri’s ability to convey emotions is?

© Battle News

Anri landed stiff kicks to Mari’s chest before twisting Mari’s arm and delivering an Angle Slam in the most non-rookie fashion ever, so much so that I had to clip it. It’s really hard to stop yourself getting too excited about someone’s potential when they do manoeuvres that rookies should not be doing. Mari caught Anri on her seated senton attempt and powerbombed her to the mat. Mari pinned Anri with the Abyss Drop to go through to the finals. This match was awesome, and they laid it out exactly how I wanted to, with Mari and Anri shining, and Act away doing her own thing.

Actwres-5 “Blue”, Riko Fukunaga, took on Actwres-5 “Pink”, Naru, in a singles match. It was under 7 minutes, with a highlight Naru fighting from underneath Riko. Naru’s selling was once again exceptional.

Nagisa Shiotsuki teamed with Yukina Uehara to take on Toiro Hina and Actwres-5’s Yui Tensho, in her second match back as she tries to pick up some momentum to impress her other faction members, or risk being kicked out of the group. Nagisa had made her gimmick her chops, and rightly so, because she gets a sound on them that I can’t recall anyone else in the scene gets currently. Yukina tagged in and landed a rear view on Hino. It doesn’t fit in with the rest of her skillset, particularly her great kicks. I love her gimmick as the rookie that will kick your chest in with a smile while prancing around the ring like an innocent pixie, so anything that leans more into that is great. Tensho tried to save Toiro from a second Yukina penalty kick and absorbed it herself, in an attempt to prove her strength to Actwres-5. I don’t think there’s another dojo that teaches their wrestlers harder forearms than AWG, as Tensho and Yukina left their forearms on each other’s chests. Yukina had enough and pelted Tensho with a kick.

© Battle News

In a funny moment, Yukina had kicked Tensho twice, and was waiting for Tensho to return fire. Tensho was still in pain from the previous kicks, so Yukina got bored of waiting (noticing that it is meant to be a fight after all) and followed up with two further stuff kicks. I’m fully on board the Yukina train. The way she bullied Tensho and Toiro in this match was super fun. After a roundhouse kick from Yukina, Nagisa hit Tensho with the Off-the-Lips suplex for the win. After the match, Nagisa was confused how Yukina would team up with Natsuki to take on Saori Anou & Natsupoi at the Korakuen Hall show if Yukina is challenging for Sakura’s KING Title on 26th July. It would imply that if Yukina wins, then the KING Title isn’t being defended at Korakuen, so has she already accepted that she would lose? Yukina excitedly said she’d win and then go on to defend the KING Title against Natsupoi and Saori (not sure how that would work, but I like Yukina’s optimism). Marino chimed in saying there was no way Sakura would lose to Yukina, so Nagisa could challenge Sakura at Korakuen Hall for the KING Title. Nagisa agreed.

In the opener, Asako Mia, who eats pins for breakfast, allowed Chii Aoba to pick up her first singles win of 2025 with a half-Boston crab. Aoba had just pinned Yui Tensho the week before, so she’s gaining some momentum. I think it was smart putting her against Asako Mia, as I got to see a more aggressive side of Aoba and I thought her performance in this match was great. It was a nice touch when she dropped Asako with a spinning body slam and pouted when it was only a 2 count. Even she thinks she should be putting Asako away with one move. Aoba even kicked Asako on the way out of the ring. Asako did not look bad at all in this match, there wasn’t that awkwardness in her moves that I’ve noticed before. It was a pretty solid opener. Asako said after the match that Aoba had betrayed her, but Asako Army would live forever, so I’m guessing Aoba has now left Asako Army.

Full Results

Chii Aoba defeats Asako Mia (8:29)

Nagisa Shiotsuki & Yukina Uehara defeat Toiro Hina & Yui Tensho (11:39)

Riko Fukunaga defeats Naru (6:41)

ACT Game Semi Final Point Tag Team Match:
Act & Mari defeat Anri & Erisa Nagai (13:12)

AWG Title Point Match:
Marino Saihara (c) defeats Nene Arahata (10:59)

AWG News & Upcoming Shows

The current standing of the ACT Game tournament, which is to crown the first AWG Tag Team Champions, is as follows:

On 2nd August, we will find out if we are getting an all-Killer’Z final if Great ASAKO and MARU advance – or a final with the best two teams, the top of Killer’Z, Amaterasu versus the top of Actwres-5, MRC.

© ChocoPro

ChocoPro #462 ~ It’s Timeee

18th July 2025
TOKYOSQUARE, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: YouTube (Free!)

ChocoPro returned for another in-ring show at TOKYOSQUARE in Itabashi, Tokyo, with Mei Suruga defending her Super Asia Championship against Miya Yotsuba in a great main event. Mei has been on a run of strong title defences in 2025, starting with Emi Sakura on 5th May, and continues to make her case for being the least-watched-best-talent in the scene, despite all of her title defences being free on YouTube. With ChocoPro, there may be an element of hesitation because most people associate them with their chocolate-covered mat, but they do have ordinary wrestling shows, too, in which Mei’s title defences take place. (Editor’s Note: Okay, WTF?) The barrier to entry for ChocoPro is quite low, but if you’re someone that requires the full backstory there is an excellent poster on Reddit that posts a guide for every single show, and they barely get any traffic on their posts (maybe they’re just storing their guides on Reddit?). Here is the one for this show, which will do a far better job than I, and also, this newsletter section is already huge! But we’ll provide the bitesized version for the top 3 matches.

Miya Yotsuba pinned Mei Suruga on their regular shows at ChocoPro “#469” but was hesitant to ask for a title shot. After some encouragement from Mr. DDT, HARASHIMA, and EVO’s Soy, Miya mustered the courage to ask Mei for a shot, which Mei accepted. Miya lost in a gutsy effort to Baliyan Akki on the last in-ring show at “#458” covered in our previous issue. Miya is Mei’s first ever student, making this a milestone match for the two. This match was all about whether Mei’s unique, creative and technical style could hold onto Miya’s repertoire of power moves and strikes. Miya dug deep, hitting a Superman hammer on Mei early on and catching Mei during a head scissors to deliver a backbreaker. Miya looked like she was going to break her teacher in two with an inverted cloverleaf. No two Mei matches are the same – in this match, it was a creative back-and-forth series of counters that were ended by Miya spearing Mei out of her boots.

Mei accelerated the pace and almost finished Miya off with the springboard double foot stomp. The loudest reaction of the night was a near fall when Miya almost pinned Mei, the same way she had beaten her weeks before at “#459”, before following up with Miyahammer for another nearfall. In the end, it was Mei’s lethal Phoenix Rise pin that put a stop to Miya’s momentum and finished the match.

Backstage, after the match, Miya was distraught. She had so badly wanted to beat her teacher for the title. She reminisced on losing to Rina Yamashita (Mei’s next challenger) at ChocoPro’s last Korakuen Hall event in August 2024, and then again in singles action in a ring a month after that. Yamashita had said that whoever won the title would defend against her next, so with Miya wanting revenge for the losses to Yamashita over the years, it stung her all the more. But Miya said she would not give up until she became Super Asia Champion. Sometimes it’s the simple stories that work, and Miya crying her eyes out about how much the title means to her is as simple as it gets to get behind an underdog.

The Asia Dream Tag Team Champions, Bellflowers (Sayaka & Makoto) successfully defended their titles for the 3rd time against the acrobatic, ninja-like team of Sawadee Kamen & Hagane Shinnou. They earned their shot by defeating Chris Brookes & Baliyan Akki at #458, after Chie Koshikawa injured herself before the show and had to be replaced by Akki pulling double duty. This was an excellent intergender tag match which was hard hitting, balancing the tight rope carefully between the men looking like bullies, but also making Bellflowers look great during their comebacks. In particular, Sayaka was the star of the match with her selling. Kamen had beaten Sayaka twice with a roll-up, so Sayaka scored her revenge when she pinned Kamen to retain the titles.

At “#458”, GM Aoi Kizuki announced that Emi Sakura would be returning from the US for “#462” to face Soy in a singles match. Soy first appeared in ChocoPro in September on “#393”, facing Sakura in the main event in a losing effort. Soy has stayed in ChocoPro ever since in order to learn under Sakura, and now, the rematch took place inside a ring rather than the chocolate mat. In the rematch, Sakura attacked Soy immediately with her gown to a chorus of boos. The crowd rallied behind Soy in this match. The crowd enjoyed seeing Soy bring out the boxing stance with Sakura completely unable to contend with Soy’s body blows. However, Sakura had the advantage in the chopping battle, but after being rocked by a spear, had to hold on by resorting to taking the victory with La Magistral.

Also on the show, HARASHIMA teamed up with Baliyan Akki to take on Chon Shiryu and Gokigen Pro’s Kaori Yoneyama (in her alter ego as Lee Yoneyamakao).

ChocoPro’s next in-ring shows are “Game Changer” on 5th September at Shin-Kiba 1st RING, where Mei will defend against Rina Yamashita, and 5th October at Itabashi Green Hall.

Emi Sakura will face Mei Suruga in Jersey City, USA, on 10th August, as part of North Carolina promotion DPW’s “Beast Coast” show. Sakura is on the road to her 30th Anniversary show on 30th October at Shinjuku FACE.

Full Results

Antonio Honda & Tokiko Kirihara defeat Chris Brookes & Kaho Hiromi and Hiyori Yawata & Sayaka Obihiro (7:03)

Baliyan Akki & HARASHIMA defeat Chon Shiryu & Lee Yoneyamakao (Kaori Yoneyama) (8:50)

Emi Sakura defeats Soy (9:01)

Asia Dream Tag Team Title:
Bellflowers (Makoto & Sayaka) (c) defeat Hagane Shinnou & Sawasdee Kamen (14:07)

Super Asia Title:
Mei Suruga (c) defeats Miya Yotsuba (13:42)

© BBM

LLPW-X
Hono Emaki Vol. 1 ~ Challenge and Succession

4th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 250
Kanda Myojin Hall, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: YouTube (Free!)

Ladies Legend Pro Wrestling-X (LLPW-X) was set up in 1992 following a split of Japan Women Pro-Wrestling into LLPW and the Japanese Women Pro-Wrestling Project (JWP). JWP later disbanded in 2017, with splinter promotions such as PURE-J being created from the ashes. LLPW-X is still running to this day, but since 2002 it has been under the leadership of Shinobu Kandori, who has been at LLPW since the start. Kandori, a bronze medallist judoka in 1984, is more known for her all-time great matches in All Japan Women’s, such as the 1993 match with Akira Hokuto, due to the lack of popularity of LLPW. The promotion is on a smaller scale to the other independents we cover, so its full history and backstory will have to wait for another day.

Today, LLPW-X is one of the few places to see rising star NORI, 26. NØRI initially debuted in Ice Ribbon in 2017. You might be thinking, “Oh, another Ice Ribbon graduate,” but NØRI has an MMA background, training since the age of 6 and making her MMA debut at age 14. The connection to Ice Ribbon and trying out wrestling is that both her and Tsukasa Fujimoto are from Miyagi, where NØRI was still fighting out of her gym, Team DATE. Months after her debut, she had a serious injury and was sidelined. After being inactive for over a year, in February 2019 Ice Ribbon announced that all of Team DATE would no longer appear in Ice Ribbon, allowing them to focus on the next period of their lives. NØRI left Team DATE in 2021 before joining Pravajra. NØRI’s last MMA fight was in March 2024, and she currently has a record of 6 wins, 7 losses and 1 draw.

© deep jewels

NØRI made her comeback to professional wrestling on 21st November 2023 in LLPW-X at Takako Inoue’s 35th Anniversary event. LLPW-X do not run events very often, and with the time that NØRI took out, even though it has been 8 years since NORI’s debut, NØRI has only had 62 matches, with over half of them coming during the 5 month period in Ice Ribbon. NØRI competed in Marigold’s Dream Star Grand Prix in 2024 which was when she first popped up on everyone’s radar, impressing in several matches, especially her match with MIRAI. Since then, she has faded back into the comfort of LLPW-X, not getting much ring time. NORI unexpectedly popped up for a match in Diana in June, which we reviewed in our last issue. Visibility has been a real uphill struggle for NØRI, but it’s been difficult to know what her ambitions are, until now.

LLPW-X announced that they would be running a monthly residency at Kanda Myojin Hall in Tokyo. It’s a cool, stylish hall which opened up in 2018 and can hold around 300 seated, and 700 standing. The first wrestling events held there were in 2025 by CyberFight (DDT & TJPW). LLPW-X running monthly shows is a massive up-tick in frequency from their previous schedule, so we will see how they manage it logistically, and attendance-wise. LLPW-X’s first show of their monthly residency on 4th July had an announced attendance of 250 (via Shupro). If true, that would beat TJPW’s attendance in the same building earlier in the year, although that was a heavily trimmed down card due to “WrestleMania” Weekend. Either way, it can be assumed that NØRI is a big reason LLPW-X were able to pull this residency move off. The last thing to mention is distribution. Matches from the show are uploaded in full on Kandori’s YouTube channel, for free. Not all matches will be uploaded, but the majority, and very likely all NØRI ones. They’re usually uploaded a week or so after the event.

© BBM

In the main event, NØRI took on the very popular freelancer, Ryo Mizunami. Despite her popularity, the match started with loud NØRI chants, as her home promotion’s fans willed her to break the tight headlock Mizunami had locked in. NØRI struggled to get much of a foothold in the first 5 minutes of the match, but did well selling the struggle of the holds. Mizunami briefly allowed NØRI to stand, and NØRI countered quickly with a snapmare and fired the first stiff kick into Mizunami’s back. Mizunami, pissed off, immediately stood up and floored NØRI with an elbow before delivering her signature machine-gun chops.

NØRI is an excellent striker, as you would expect as a former MMA fighter. She picked Mizunami up before landing a kick to the right leg, head and a side kick to the chest in quick succession. As she attempted to follow it up with a left roundhouse kick, Mizunami ducked so NØRI quickly adapted and dropped her with the right roundhouse kick. Striking is such a key skillset a top joshi wrestler should have, and NORI already possesses it in spades. NØRI started working on Mizunami’s arm, softening it with an armbar which Mizunami sold hard for, given NØRI’s background. Mizunami resorted to the headlock she started the fight with, in what is probably one of the least boring headlock spots, as she sold the exhaustion well and at multiple times tried to roll out of it as if she was in an MMA fight. Moments later, NØRI dropped Mizunami with a headkick out of nowhere and then unleashed an awesome barrage of kicks at Mizunami, even shoving the referee away. NØRI has a great fighting spirit fire-up that will whip up a big crowd into a frenzy in future.

NØRI is clearly still trying new things out, as she went for a springboard kick but slipped. She does have an amazing spin kick that she lands on the opponent’s head as they are running. At the 15 minute mark, NØRI just decided to slap the crap out of Mizunami with a torrent of stiff open-handed strikes, trying to knock Mizunami out. Mizunami retaliated with a thudding lariat, spear and diving leg drop for the win.

© BBM

After the match, Mizunami told NØRI that she believed she could become the future of not just LLPW-X, but joshi wrestling. NØRI asked Mizunami if she felt her fighting spirit. Mizunami yelled, without a mic, that she did, but NØRI still has to push harder to stand out. NØRI then replied that she wants to become a star who carries the future of professional wrestling. Is this monthly residency the beginning of NØRI’s breakout? Will she start to take more outside bookings and dedicate herself to it? We’ll find out.

LLPW-X has a rookie called Wakana, who debuted on the 28th March show. She faced the challenge of hard-nosed veteran Yumiko Hotta. Kandori is participating in Hotta’s 40th anniversary at Korakuen Hall on 15th August, so this was a chance for some cross-promotion with Hotta. Kandori will be teaming up with Miku Kanae on that show. The rules of the match were that Wakana had to survive 5 minutes, or pin Hotta for 2 seconds, in order to win the match. Hotta only had to pin Wakana for 5 seconds, which she did so with a lariat. It’s far too early to say anything about how Wakana might turn out for LLPW-X.

Also on the card was Diana’s Haruka Umesaki taking on Miku Kanae, who is part of Hotta’s T-HEARTS promotion. Given NØRI appearing on Diana weeks earlier, there may be a partnership brewing there.

LLPW-X’s next show is on 21st August where NØRI will main event against Sendai Girls’ Mika Iwata, in another marquee singles match. Their styles are much more closely matched than Mizunami and NØRI so it should be a great match. The full card for the show is:

Full Results

Yumiko Hotta defeats Wakana (4:47)

Haruka Umesaki defeats Miku Kanae (10:34)

Catherine, Shinobu Kandori & Takako Inoue defeat Dump Matsumoto, Megumi Yabushita & ZAP (8:07)

Ryo Mizunami defeats NØRI (16:39)

PURE-J
Pure Spirit Vol. 3

20th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 149
Shin-Kiba 1st RING, Tokyo, Japan

You might be thinking “Oh no, Social Suplex have added yet another obscure, small company to their coverage.” You would be correct. Yes, yes we have. But relax, it’ll be one show a month at most. On a serious note, PURE-J are a company that are probably the least reported on in the scene, despite drawing almost double Ice Ribbon’s numbers at Korakuen Hall. The fact it is so off the radar that people don’t bother pirating their shows uploaded to YouTube lands the promotion in an infinite loop of obscurity. For me, there are a few talents on the roster that make it worth following the promotion, and I’ve found it a comforting watch in 2025. PURE-J was created in 2017 by Commander Bolshoi from the ashes of Japanese Women Pro-Wrestling Project (JWP), and so it is a long-lost cousin of LLPW-X.

PURE-J have a similar distribution model to Ice Ribbon, although PURE-J’s bigger shows get uploaded to YouTube rather than a PPV on a streaming website. They also run regular dojo shows, with bigger shows at Ota Cita Industrial Plaza or Itabashi Green Hall that are usually named, in this case “Pure Spirit”. Unlike Ice Ribbon however, PURE-J are more reserved with Korakuen Hall, and only ran the famous venue twice in 2024, and likely twice again in 2025. We will only report on the monthly B-level shows with title defences, and the bi-annual Korakuen shows. Let’s leave the dojo shows for our Ice Ribbon section.

There are three main talents I enjoy watching: one is Crea, who if you want to know more about, just read our Ice Ribbon sections as she is a regular there. Despite PURE-J being quite a heavy ‘lucharesu’ style, with masked wrestlers such as Leon at the top, Crea has loud strikes, beats the hell out of people and has a great German suplex finisher. She is a wrestler that was made for me. The second is Hanako Nakamori, who will make her return from injury in August. She was the last ever JWP Openweight Champion, beating Arisa Nakajima for it. Nakamori is simply a really good worker with airtight fundamentals. There are some wrestlers whose floor is a good match, and Nakamori is one of those.

The last wrestler I want to highlight is Crea’s tag team partner in Creakari, AKARI. AKARI is a Chilean wrestler, whose wrestling journey properly started with Commander Bolshoi in PURE-J in 2019. She had done a few matches in Chile, but ultimately she was steeped in the PURE-J style. She is completely fluent in Japanese, which you can see if you tune in to PURE-J’s livestreams where she is interacting live with the fans. The below photo is old, as Creakari are no longer champions, but I wanted to show them in their full glory. Both of these wrestlers are the real deal – either by themselves, or as a tag team.

© Akari

In the 3rd installment of “Pure Spirit”, AKARI took a shot at the top title, the PURE-J Openweight Championship, currently held by SAKI, who runs her own promotion COLORS. SAKI has a bit of reputation of “phoning it in” nowadays, and she did not do much to dispel that reputation in this match, while AKARI wrestled hard trying to get the absolute most out of the match. After AKARI’s great Northern Lights suplex, AKARI hit her signature step up knee strike on a dazed SAKI. AKARI sensed it was her moment, but took a bit too long on the top ropes and was caught out by SAKI with a superplex. AKARI held on, kicking out at the last second of a pumphandle slam, but SAKI’s signature running brainbuster was one move too many for AKARI, as SAKI retained the title. Rydeen Hagane and Leon came out after, teasing the Korakuen Hall match up for the top title. AKARI and Crea had a fight after, since Crea’s attitude has changed slightly since joining Ancham’s Bad Butts faction in Ice Ribbon. Three of my top PURE-J matches of 2025 have involved both AKARI and Crea.

Ganbare Pro Wrestling’s duo, Moeka Haruhi and Yuna Manase, beat Kaori Yoneyama & Leon to win the Daily Sports Women’s Tag Team Championship. Haruhi works regularly in PURE-J, while this was just Manase’s second match in the promotion. Hanako Nakamori came out, after being injured for a few months, to challenge for the titles with Kaho Kobayashi.

Chie Ozora is currently doing a storyline where Risa Sera is sending assassins to finish her. Ozora and Sera unsuccessfully challenged for the tag titles on 16th May, and Sera has not been seen in the promotion since, despite appearing regularly in recent years (and holding the top title). Mio Shirai was the assassin on this show, beating Ozora, but not ending her. Surely Risa Sera will send more to finish the job? (Yes, she will. It’s Makoto.)

Ancham, most regularly wrestling in Ice Ribbon where she is an International Ribbon Tag Team Champion and in a faction with Crea, teamed up with Momo Tani to take on Cherry and Kaho Kobayashi. Kaho works PURE-J regularly, as you can imagine given her lucha roots. Momo Tani is a PURE-J wrestler who started in *checks notes*… Actwres girl’Z. Yes, again, they’re everywhere, aren’t they? Crea was in the opener and exchanged some hard hitting action with the big, tough Rydeen Hagane.

The events of “Pure Spirit Vol. 3” lead us into PURE-J’s 8th anniversary event at Korakuen Hall on 11th August, with the card as of writing announced as:

Full Results

KAZUKI & Rydeen Hagane defeat Crea & Jenne (12:16)

Cherry & Kaho Kobayashi defeat Ancham & Momo Tani (12:30)

Mio Shirai defeats Chie Ozora (8:55)

Daily Sports Tag Team Title:
Moeka Haruhi & Yuna Manase defeat Kaori Yoneyama & Leon (c) (15:04)

PURE-J Openweight Title:
SAKI (c) defeats AKARI (16:19)

© BJW

BJW

27th July 2025
Company Announced Attendance: 504
Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: BJW Core / YouTube

BJW held their monthly Korakuen Hall show in front of yet another sparsely populated crowd, as even the draw of Daisuke Sekimoto’s return in the main event could not entice people back to the bleachers of the famous Tokyo venue. Sekimoto was injured on 29th May following a seemingly innocuous tornado DDT. After MRT and CT scans, as well as further examinations by neurosurgeons, Sekimoto was cleared to continue wrestling. Following the injury, BJW president Eiji Tosaka and Sekimoto came to the agreement that Sekimoto should enjoy the latter stages of his career as a freelancer. Sekimoto subsequently pulled out of bookings in July and had initially targeted an August return, before it was announced that he would return at the July Korakuen Hall show. It wasn’t a particularly exhilarating Korakuen show, with the undercard flying by in under an hour and the main event mostly a house-show style homecoming for Sekimoto.

In the main event, Sekimoto teamed up with Ikkitousen Strong Climb runner-up So Daimonji to take on Abdullah Kobayashi & Ryuji Ito. Ito came through the ranks with Sekimoto, debuting a month before him in 1999 as they faced off against each other regularly. Kobayashi debuted a few years earlier in 1995. Sekimoto received a hero’s welcome as the crowd was happy to see him well and healthy. The match itself was much less important than the moment of his return.

Kosuke Sato successfully defended his BJW Junior Heavyweight Championship against Polish wrestler Jacob Crane, in what was the match of the night (by quite a bit). Sato had chased the title for 6 years before beating Ikuto Hidaka on 5th May. In turn, Crane has been chasing Sato ever since. Crane has been on his current tour with BJW since October 2024. On 22nd June, Crane took Sato’s belt and used it as a weapon, angering Sato into accepting a challenge. At a signing ceremony on 18th July, Sato explained his dislike for Crane, pointing to Crane’s direct, blunt, and in his view, rude attitude. That attitude was on full display in this great title match.

© BJW

The Korakuen Hall crowd was silent as the match started, as they usually are during technical grappling sequences in appreciation of the performers. The first strike was dealt by Crane as he kicked Sato in the back, and from there, the starting pistol had been fired and it was all go. The fight spilled to the outside as Crane was caught by Sato’s fierce kick on the apron. Crane was aggressive, slapping the hat off of a booing spectator and snarling at others. Throughout the feud, Crane had done an excellent job in acting like it was his fate to take the title from Sato. After exchanging headbutts, Sato spiked Crane’s head onto the apron. Sato slowly lifted Crane from the floor to reveal that Crane was bleeding profusely, covered in a crimson mask. Back in the ring, Crane was caught in an armbar, and as he slowly stood up to his feet, attempting to lift Sato up to break the hold, blood was dripping from his forehead onto Sato’s face.

They started slapping each other hard across the face before Crane delivered a Fisherman’s Buster into a beautiful German suplex for a near fall. It was at this point where the match could have launched into top gear, but the foot was taken off of the pedal. Crane rolled out of the ring to pick up the belt he craved, the same tactic that earned him this title shot by baiting Sato. Crane then undid the turnbuckle pad while in a guillotine hold, and rammed Sato into the exposed turnbuckle. While the referee was fixing the pad, Crane lowblowed Sato. Crane took advantage of Sato in pain and tried going for a cutter but was caught in a rear naked choke. He once again used the exposed turnbuckle to break the hold. Crane assaulted Sato with a loud rolling elbow for a close fall that the crowd believed was it. Crane brought a chair into the ring which distracted the ref enough for him to hit Sato with the title, but Sato kicked out. Crane attempted another rolling elbow but Sato, wise to it, ducked under and delivered a German suplex, into another guillotine hold, before suplexing him for the victory. The match was shaping up to be excellent before the cheating, which did fit into the story, but Crane was already getting booed before that point with his demeanour.

Daichi Hashimoto, Hideyoshi Kamitani, Kazumasa Yoshida & Yasufumi Nakanoue clashed with Fuminori Abe, Leyton Buzzard, Takuya Nomura & Yuya Aoki in an all-star 8 man tag team match. This was a fun party match in the best meaning of the phrase possible, which, considering the participants, is not surprising. The only two participants who had not held the World Strong Heavyweight Title were Yoshida (challenged Aoki twice), Abe (challenged Nakanoue once) and Buzzard (challenged Aoki once). Buzzard, a month out from his big tournament win in the Ikkitousen Strong Climb, got his first ever pinfall on the champion Hashimoto, previewing their BJW World Strong Heavyweight Title match on 24th August in Aichi.

Rookie Koshiro Asakura faced a monumental, giant hurdle in the form of Ryota Hama. It proved to be a hurdle too big, as a splash from Hama was enough to get the win. After the show, Asakura announced that he had been diagnosed with a torn anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) as a result of the match and estimated that it may take a year to recover fully. That is a massive blow to BJW in what is already a spiraling nightmare year of dwindling attendances.

BJW’s next Korakuen Hall show is only 2 weeks later on 11th August. On 24th August, BJW are running their annual show “Death Mania” in Aichi, Nagoya.

Full Results

Kaji Tomato & Kota Sekifuda defeat Ryuma Sekimo & Tatsuhiko Yoshino (8:21)

Hardcore Tag: Channing Decker & Kankuro Hoshino defeat Kazumi Kikuta & Masaya Takahashi (6:52)

Ryota Hama defeats Koshiro Asakura (6:49)

Astronauts (Fuminori Abe & Takuya Nomura), Leyton Buzzard & Yuya Aoki defeat Kazumasa Yoshida, Okami (Daichi Hashimoto & Hideyoshi Kamitani) & Yasufumi Nakanoue (14:00)

BJW Junior Heavyweight Title:
Kosuke Sato (c) defeats Jacob Crane (20:54)

W-Daichan (Daisuke Sekimoto & So Daimonji) defeat Abdullah Kobayashi & Ryuji Ito (15:46)

© miri@Uem_Ujr

Produce Shows
Shinjuku Face 20th Anniversary

31st July 2025
Shinjuku FACE, Tokyo, Japan
Watch On: Wrestle Universe

Shinjuku FACE is a small venue in the heart of Tokyo with a capacity of around 600. While it is not as famous as the sacred Korakuen Hall, it is one of the most important venues for independent Japanese promotions, such as OZ Academy, SEAdLINNNG or WAVE, who run their B-level shows there and reliably draw a hot crowd of a few hundred (with Korakuen Hall remaining as their A-level shows). Even some larger companies who can run a larger 2,000 to 5,000 show once or twice a year will still run Shinjuku FACE several times a year, such as NOAH, DDT, TJPW and Marigold. It has also become a hotbed for produce shows, either someone’s retirement, like Tae Honma later this year, or a wrestler’s first produce show, like Chikayo Nagashima in June 2025, or just regular produce shows like the Astronauts (Fuminori Abe & Takuya Nomura) “We Are Fighting Detectives” series and Sareee’s “Sareee-ISM” series. Why I personally love Shinjuku FACE is because it is probably one of the hottest crowds anywhere, they elevate every match and they always have fun.

Shinjuku FACE held a show to commemorate their 20th anniversary involving wrestlers from a variety of promotions, including those mentioned above, with heavy influence from DDT, who run over 15 shows at the venue a year and helped produce this show. Many fans in the crowd had DDT-related merch and the vibes of the show were very much DDT. Overall, it was a fun 2 and a half hours.

The main event was All Japan’s Atsuki Aoyagi teaming up with DDT’s Yuki Ueno to go up against DDT/ChocoPro/Baka Gaijin’s Chris Brookes and New Japan’s Hiromu Takahashi in an all-star tag match. Although Atsuki is still a junior heavyweight in All Japan, he is pushed quite strongly and as of writing is due to face Rising HAYATO in the final of their “Jr. Festival” tournament on 3rd August. He’s also All Japan main eventer Yuma Aoyagi’s brother. The crowd was on fire for this match with four very popular wrestlers. This time-limit draw match was great and highlighted Atsuki, who is the least known out of the four, as well as the fact that All Japan barely run Shinjuku FACE. If you’re here for the workrate, but can still tolerate some fun such as Brookes’ rubber bands, this is the match to check out on the card. Hiromu took a liking to Schadenfreude International’s mascot, Bunbun, before all four closed out the show.

Kuroshio TOKYO Japan (Ikemen) went head-to-head with DDT’s MAO. On paper, you might have this on the undercard and have it be a 10 minute comedy match, with over 8 minutes of Ikeman doing his entrance. In practice, this was the semi-main event, and instead was 18 minutes of a mixture of comedy and some good wrestling… still with over 8 minutes of Ikeman doing his entrance. Yes, I timed it. This was one of the few Ikeman matches I did end up liking even if it went a bit long. There were a lot of shenanigans with the DDT bike as MAO struggled to ride it on the narrow Shinjuku tabletops. They gave up and started to pummel each other with hard strikes, before Ikeman gave MAO a Deadeye on the table, leading to a close 19 count. Once back in the ring, they exchanged solid strikes interspersed with comedy, such as Ikeman not falling for MAO’s lookaway punch and trying his own version. MAO won with a bridging Gedo clutch.

Shin Sakura Hirota made another increasingly rare appearance after she massively reduced her schedule in order to focus on her political ambitions. She teamed up with DDT’s Schadenfreude International (Antonio Honda & Takeshi Masada) to go up against the trio you never thought you wanted until you saw it, HARASHIMA, Mayumi Ozaki & Yukio Naya. Ozaki heads up the OZ Academy promotion which runs monthly shows at Shinjuku FACE. Konosuke Takeshita’s music played and I figured we were getting Shin Konosuke Takeshita, as Sakura Hirota has played that role before, and sure enough, she came out in full Takeshita cosplay, including the fake abs. This was your typical Shin cosplay match, with some usual Anton bits thrown in. There was a sequence when Shin Takeshita and Ozaki were throwing elbows and backhand fists into thin air just missing each other completely for like a minute. Ozaki dodged Anton’s Gon the Fox strike and hit her backfist strike on Shin Takeshita for the win.

© miri@Uem_Ujr

DDT’s DAMNATION T.A. faced Kazuki Hirata, Makoto Oishi and Toru Owashi. Hirata got tapped out by Sasaki within a few seconds. Everyone was leaving again before the Shinjuku FACE GM Ogawa called out Sanshiro Takagi and lectured him, referee Matsui and his wrestlers. They restarted the match – although this time, every time Hirata tapped out, Matsui would be distracted by Owasi or Oishi so that the match wouldn’t end too quickly.

Shinsuke Nakamura’s tribute act, Chinsuke Nakamura, teamed with Minoru Suzuki to take on Futotta Kobashi and Jun Akiyama. To be honest, the tribute act is really good. Suzuki had a lot of fun brawling with Kobashi, including putting Kobashi’s head between his legs and then spanking his rear. I think Dino’s feud with Suzuki earlier in the year may have transferred some homoerotic desires into Suzuki. (Editor’s Note: Hell, yeah!) Suzuki also did some Nakamura spots, so he was in full fun mode here, it’s the happiest I’ve seen Suzuki in 2025, and I saw him have a blast in DDT in Nagoya (1st June). For a comedy match, this was very well structured. They got Kobashi very over such that the crowd exploded when he blasted Suzuki with a lariat. This match exceeded expectations and is a sleeper pick for one of the better DDT-style matches this year.

Full Results

DAMNATION T.A. (Daisuke Sasaki, Hideki Okatani & Ilusion) defeat Kazuki Hirata, Makoto Oishi & Toru Owashi (0:07)

DAMNATION T.A. (Daisuke Sasaki, Hideki Okatani & Ilusion) defeat Kazuki Hirata, Makoto Oishi & Toru Owashi (7:01)

Chinsuke Nakamura & Minoru Suzuki defeat Futotta Kobashi & Jun Akiyama (13:15)

HARASHIMA, Mayumi Ozaki & Yukio Naya defeat Antonio Honda, Shin Sakura Hirota & Takeshi Masada (16:36)

MAO defeats Kuroshio TOKYO Japan (18:26)

Chris Brookes & Hiromu Takahashi vs. Atsuki Aoyagi & Yuki Ueno – Time Limit Draw (20:00)

© Riot City Wrestling

Oceania News

Barry “Lucky” O’Leary took home the win in BCW’s “Best in Battle 2” tournament on July 26th, having overcome Robbie Thorpe in the quarters, Tome Filip in the semis, and Mick Moretti in the final across the two nights. Outside of tournament action, there was also two title changes in Melbourne, as Sam Yannis captured the BCW Battle Express Championship from Levi Nixon and Tarlee picked up the BCW Women’s Title in a three way match against previous champions Frankie B and Caity Luxe.

Tarlee will compete for another Women’s Championship, as she faces PCW Australia Women’s Title holder Aysha at “Ignition” on August 9th. Tommy Hellfire will also defend the PCW National Championship against Ryan Rapid on the same show.

NJPW’s Robbie Eagles will return to Wrestle Rampage for the first time in over six years. The TMDK member will face Tommy Knight on August 22nd in Adelaide.

Melbourne City Wrestling will see their Intercommonwealth Title defended at one of the most southern points of the world on August 9th, as Adam Brooks travels to Invercargill, New Zealand, for SPW’s “Southern Rumble”. His challenger will be Liam Fury.

© SETUP

Other News From Asia

There was a further addition to heel group Real Global Threat on July 20th, as DDT’s Chris Brookes turned on SETUP World Heavyweight Champion Jonathan Johnson after failing to capture SETUP’s top title in the main event of “SETUP 23: Under Pressure”. Brookes was the unpinned party in the three way, with Johnson besting SETUP Openweight Champion Andruew Tang after a Senton Bomb.

Johnson thought he finally had an ally after numerous betrayals, but it was not to be, with Brookes assisting with a beatdown on Johnson, having originally looked like he would assist him. Johnson was left a bloody mess, and Real Global Threat had increased its membership to five men.

Brookes is the first representative from a Japanese promotion – joining Tang, Malaysia Pro Wrestling’s South East Asia Champion Shivam, Filipino wrestler Jake De Leon and Malaysian Emman Azman, who was previously a top babyface in the country. The increased reach of the group and the faction story occurring across multiple promotions in several countries is impressive to see and probably one of the most underreported regional wrestling stories this year.

The next chapter in the rivalry could well occur on the weekend of August 23rd/24th, as Shivam and Johnson travel to Dexcon PH in the Philippines for multiple shows. Both are scheduled to defend their SETUP Championships in Manila, with local member of Real Global Threat, Jake De Leon, also scheduled to wrestle. De Leon will also make his debut for Vietnam Pro Wrestling later this month.

APAC Malaysia have filled out the majority of their card for their big summer event “Slamfest ‘25” on August 30th in Mont Kiara. The show is built around the usage of WWE ID talent, with the APAC Women’s Champion Nor “Phoenix” Diana defending against Kylie Rae and Cappuccino Jones challenging APAC Champion Azroy as the top two matches.

Alfa Nazri will also face Sean Legacy, whilst Double K wrestles Jordan Oasis. The WWE ID branding is in full usage for each applicable competitor, as well as for the overall show.

There is also talent from outside the collaboration, though, with Raj Dhesi traveling to Malaysia to face The Statement (Andruew Tang) and TJPW’s Kira Summer wrestling in a four way to name a number one contender for the APAC Women’s Championship. Filipino Crystal, Mio Shirai and Australian Tarlee fill out the field for the match. TMDK’s Marcus Pitt and Damian Slater will also enter the Tag Team Cup gauntlet match.

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