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Csonka’s NJPW Road to Power Struggle Review 11.01.15
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NJPW Road to Power Struggle 11.01.15
OFFICIAL RESULTS
– Yohei Komatsu, Sho Tanaka & Jushin Thunder Liger defeated David Finlay, Jay White & Tiger Mask IV @ 7:15 via submission [***]
– Hirooki Goto, Katsuyori Shibata & Mascara Dorada defeated Juice Robinson, Togi Makabe & Captain New Japan @ 8:35 via submission [**]
– Alex Shelley & KUSHIDA defeated Chase Owens & Kenny Omega defeated 10:05 @ via pin [***]
– Karl Anderson, Doc Gallows, Bad Luck Fale & Tama Tonga defeated YOSHI-HASHI, Shinsuke Nakamura, Kazushi Sakuraba & Toru Yano @ 12:10 via pin [**]
– Kazuchika Okada, Gedo & Tomohiro Ishii defeated Ryusuke Taguchi, Hiroshi Tanahashi & Tomoaki Honma @ 13:50 via [***]
– Super Jr. Tag Tournament Semifinals: Matt Sydal & Ricochet defeated The Young Bucks @ 12:05 via pin [****]
– Super Jr. Tag Tournament Semifinals: Rocky Romero & Beretta defeated Bobby Fish & Kyle O’Reilly @ 20:06 via pin [****]
Yohei Komatsu, Sho Tanaka & Jushin Thunder Liger defeated David Finlay, Jay White & Tiger Mask IV: for as much as I am frustrated with their place on the card, I really enjoy these Young Lions matches. Tanaka and Komatsu are so excellent, and Finlay and White aren’t slouches either. It was short, but action packed and as always, well worked. Liger and Tiger mask are good anchors for these youngsters to be working with, and they kept their interaction at a minimum here. Komatsu, who was rather great again here, tapped Finlay with the Young Lions Tokyo Crab of doom. This was a good and fun opener.
Hirooki Goto, Katsuyori Shibata & Mascara Dorada defeated Juice Robinson, Togi Makabe & Captain New Japan: Compared to the opener, this was largely bland and dry. I wouldn’t say there was anything particularly wrong or bad about the work; it was just uninspired as Captain new Japan got beaten on for what seemed like forever. And then Juice Robinson got the “Korakuen Hall doesn’t give a fuck about you” tag, and ran mild. In a completely shocking turn of events, Captain New Japan survived the day as Juice Robinson tapped out to Gedo.
Alex Shelley & KUSHIDA defeated Chase Owens & Kenny Omega: This was a rock solid, but unspectacular match, They worked well overall together, Shelley and KUSHIDA work so effortlessly together as a team it takes lot for a match to come off back. Miscommunication between Omega and Owens led to Shelly pinning Owens to pick up the win. Post match Omega attacked Shelly and had to be pulled off of him, likely setting up a singles match soon. This was very enjoyable, on par with the opener, but worked in a completely different way.
Karl Anderson, Doc Gallows, Bad Luck Fale & Tama Tonga defeated YOSHI-HASHI, Shinsuke Nakamura, Kazushi Sakuraba & Toru Yano : Not much to this one, maybe a little too long for what they were trying to do here, but it was fine. Anderson scored with a top rope stun gun on Nakamura, leading to Anderson hitting YOSHI-HASHI with the stun gun for the win Anderson and Nakamura was the sole focus, so from that aspect it works great. Also, Anderson getting one up on Nakamura was a nice set up/tease for their scheduled title match at Power Struggle. Again, the action was solid but unspectacular, but the important thing was to add some heat to the Anderson vs. Nakamura feud.
Kazuchika Okada, Gedo & Tomohiro Ishii defeated Ryusuke Taguchi, Hiroshi Tanahashi & Tomoaki Honma : As opposed to some of the other multi-man tags, which seemingly existed, this match felt as if the pacing was set up better and has more importance to them. While Tanahashi and Okada had some interaction, it was kept to a minimum as they focused more on building to Honma vs. Ishii with this match, and they should have because it’s coming sooner and Tanahashi and Okada don’t need the build as much as the others. That’s not to say what they did was unimportant, it just wasn’t the focus. This was another fun match with Okada finishing Taguchi with the rainmaker.
Super Jr. Tag Tournament Semifinals: Matt Sydal & Ricochet defeated The Young Bucks: This ended up as a great juniors sprint, going at about 12-minutes and it was packed with action from bell to bell. The Bucks were their awesomely douchey selves here, and got a good heat on Ricochet, who the fans were strongly behind the entire time. This had good heat overall. Ricochet finally got the hot tag to Sydal, they cleaned house and hit the dueling shooting star presses for he finish. This was a great little match, with the only thing holding it back from a higher rating being the Cody Hall shenanigans and ref bump, which I felt wasn’t needed here. The crowd was hot and they didn’t need any thing extra to manufacture that heat. Still, this was a great match.
Super Jr. Tag Tournament Semifinals: Rocky Romero & Beretta defeated Bobby Fish & Kyle O’Reilly: After the previous match, Rocky Romero & Beretta defeated Bobby Fish & Kyle O’Reilly in a match that I felt was equally as good, but completely different. The previous match was a sprint/showcase style match, while this was a more traditional match featuring reDRagon focusing on working the knee of Beretta. The work was good, and if you’ve paid attention to Beretta’s post WWE career, he had a knee issues and missed some time last year due to that. O’Reilly and Fish would actually focus on different legs, basically trying to cripple Beretta throughout the match. Beretta got the hot tag, and the crowd was just as into this as the previous match, making for a great homestretch filled with tremendous moves and the rocking crowd, which only added to the action in the ring. Romero would hit a suicide dive, sending O’Reilly into the crowd. With Fish left alone, Roppongi Vice would hit Strong Zero on Fish to end a great main event.
* Matt Sydal & Ricochet face Rocky Romero & Beretta in the Super Jr. Tag Tournament finals on November 7th.
* End scene.
* Thanks for reading.
“Byyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyye Felicia!”
