Csonka Reviews Prince Devitt vs. Kenny Omega (Circuit 2010 G1 Climax Special)

With everything that’s been going down due to the Coronavirus, NJPW canceling 15 shows this month, ROH canceling their 18thanniversary weekend, I’ve been trying to fill the void with some other content. NJPW uploaded today’s offering to New Japan World, along with others I have been looking at…

* Apollo 55 vs. Golden Lovers at FantasiticaMania 2011
* Apollo 55 vs. Taichi & Taka Michinoku (G1 Climax Special 2011).

So we continue to look at the New Japan World offerings and more from two very familiar faces as IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Champion Prince Devitt battles Kenny Omega from the Circuit 2010 G1 Climax Special (9.03.10). We’ll look back on that one now…

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IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Champion Prince Devitt vs. Kenny Omega: They work into a basic counter filled opening stretch, with Devitt controlling early on until they worked into a stalemate. Devitt looked to slow things. Taking a more methodical approach and attacking the arm and grounding Kenny until Devitt was dumped and hat allowed Kenny to follow with a tope that crushed Devitt. They battled into the crowd and at ringside, with Kenny taking control on the champion as he started to attack his back, taking the heat and picking up near falls. Kenny does a nice job of focusing his work on the back of Devitt, slowing things a bit while maintaining a good control of things. Every time that Devitt starts firing up, Kenny is there to cut him off, until Devitt managed to dropkick him to the floor and connect with a beautiful tope. That started to urn the tide as the missile dropkick would score for a near fall. Kenny remained resilient, continually battling back and taking the fight to Devitt. They picked up the intensity nicely down the stretch, with some great counters and hard-hitting back and forth action until Kenny took control with a kotaru crusher on the floor from the apron. That led to near falls off of a high cross and half and half suplex, but Devitt kept fighting and countering back only to be cut off. Kenny looked to end things, but a missed 450 turned the tide, allowing Devitt to continue to survive, and really get the crowd into the closing moments. The finish saw Devitt counter the avalanche one winged angel into a double stomp and then head up top and hit one more for a near fall. Bloody Sunday finally finished Kenny. Champion Prince Devitt defeated Kenny Omega @ 17:30 [***¾] This was a match where Devitt was about 2-3 years away from really hitting his stride as a singles, while Omega was still very much DDT Kenny, and about six-years away from really breaking out as a top tier performer. The match is very good as you would expect, and only really held back from being great due to the fact that I, along with the live crowd, never really bought into Omega winning the championship. This was still a tremendously fun look back at these two guys.

This match was part of Devitt’s 364-day tile run, where he had defeated Marufuji at Dominion 2010, and would rule until Dominion 2011 when Kota Ibushi defeated him. Devitt would make his way back to the championship, defeating KUSHIDA to win the vacated (after Ibushi was sidelined with a shoulder injury) IWGP Junior Heavyweight championship (his second), and would reign for 227 days, with four title defenses until he dropped it to Low Ki at Wrestling Dontaku 2012.

The 411 on Wrestling Podcast returns to the 411 Podcasting Network for episode 101. On the show, 411’s Larry Csonka & Steve Cook look back at WrestleMania X7, the Raw the night after and then Kevin Pantoja joins to discuss ECW Guilty as Charged 2001. The show is approximately 138-mimues long.

* Intro
* WWE WrestleMania X7 Review: 7:30
* WWE Monday Night Raw Review 4.02.01: 53:55
* ECW Guilty as Charged 2001 Review: 1:23:27

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– End scene.

– Thanks for reading.

7.8

The final score: review Good

The 411

At the end of the day, this offering from Prince Devitt and Kenny Omega is a very good and tremendously fun look back at two great performers from 10-years ago.