(NOAH CHRONOLOGY) Daisuke Harada ~ GHC Junior Championship reign (3rd)



Won: 16th December 2018 at "Great Voyage In Yokohama Vol.2"
Number of title reigns: 3
Number of defenses: 1
Lost: "Great Voyage in Yokohama 2019" to Minoru Tanaka (10th March 2019)
Total number of days held: 85 

Challengers
1. YO-HEY
2. Minoru Tanaka

Chronology


VS YO-HEY
The stipulation for Daisuke Harada facing Kotaro Suzuki was that if he lost then RATELS would break up. The match against Suzuki was hard fought with every ounce of endurance and skills they possessed coming into play. Eventually, Harada put Suzuki away with the Katayama German Suplex. As RATELS gathered round to celebrate, YO-HEY grabbed a chair and knocked Harada out with it, he stood over him and told him that he would be challenging for the GHC Heavyweight before leaving with Yoshinari Ogawa and Kotaro Suzuki.

Kotaro Suzuki, the evil mastermind behind all of this (what do you expect, he is close to Ogawa, and they don't come more underhand), said something to the effect that he knew there would always be someone who was ambitious in a group that had been saved.
YO-HEY never actually gave a definitive reason for his betrayal of the unit he had been so faithful to, except to say that he wanted to show Harada a more serious side of "YO-HEY" and that he was not going to play the fool anymore (it seemed to have not occurred to him, however, that he was referring to himself in the third person).
Harada, however, was both very shocked and very angry, and had gotten hold of a chair and was searching for YO-HEY backstage. Ling Don-Xuan was pushed away, Junta Miyawaki had been pushed off of the ramp, and Harada had to be taken in hand by HAYATA and Tadasuke and led from the interview area.

The match will take place on the 26th January at Korakuen Hall.


YO-HEY & Daisuke Harada (who seemed to have calmed down from hunting YO-HEY backstage armed with a chair, but still wanted to kill him and wore his "shark smells blood" face on) took place at "Navigation For The Future 2019" on January 6th at Korakuen Hall when Harada, Tadasuke and HAYATA took on YO-HEY (who seems to enjoy being a heel), Yoshinari Ogawa and Kotaro Suzuki. Suzuki and Ogawa very much took the backseat on this one, especially when YO-HEY found himself surrounded by his former friends in RATELS and was beaten down by them. When it came to YO-HEY & HAYATA fighting, YO-HEY knew all the corners that HAYATA was waiting around, and when it came to himself and Harada, the seemingly most loyal member of RATELS, knew just how to handle him too. 
There was a development for YO-HEY in this match that he debuted as he seemed to have learnt a new submission move, a chokehold (I detect Yoshinari Ogawa's influence here). 

In the end, with HAYATA and Tadasuke knocked outside the ring and kept there by Ogawa and Suzuki, it came down to YO-HEY and Harada, YO-HEY felled him with the Super Face G, and then grinned like a demon when he pinned him. 
Then came something odd. 
HAYATA came into the ring and tended to the fallen Daisuke Harada, who was lying on his back and staring at the ceiling, when Yoshinari Ogawa approached him and said something to him before walking off with the others. HAYATA stood up, listened, then put his hands on his hips and turned away looking thoughtful. YO-HEY, who had been watching the scene, backed off too and then left with his new friends.

The HAYATA situation would deepen on the 13th January when HAYATA shook hands with Ogawa, and he didn't come out to second Harada later in the evening. Yoshinari Ogawa was out with flu from the 19th to the 26th January, meaning that plans had to be slightly changed, but Kotaro Suzuki took his place. On the 20th January, following his singles match with YO-HEY, HAYATA would shake hands with Kotaro Suzuki (who also whispered something to him), but he refused to shake hands with Harada and just walked off.

Due to Yoshinari Ogawa being sidelined with flu, the storyline had to change a bit, but it didn't stop HAYATA (much to the concern of Tadasuke and Harada), having Kotaro Suzuki shake his hand, and brushing off the others in RATELS when asked.
As far as the YO-HEY vs Harada situation went, Harada was only able to get one pinfall over YO-HEY during the pre-matches. So with the HAYATA situation hanging over them both (plus HAYATA almost putting a spanner in the works by seemingly being injured in the match before the title match, but in the event of things he was okay), they faced each other in the traditional home of RATELS, Osaka, on the 26th January 2018.
They had an epic match, lots of near pinfalls, crowd screaming, and YO-HEY (in a new black and white outfit, which is Yoshinari Ogawa's colors), pulling everything out he could against Harada. In the end it was Harada who was victorious, and he made an emotional appeal for YO-HEY to come back to RATELS. YO-HEY said, "Sorry Boss, I am not coming home."
Harada told him that in the future then, he would have no option but to crush him when they met in the ring. Later Harada would say that he would show a new RATELS, with only himself, Tadasuke and HAYATA.

HAYATA would later leave RATELS and join back up with YO-HEY.

Vs. Minoru Tanaka
When YO-HEY & Kotaro Suzuki had left, Minoru Tanaka (who last faced Harada in early 2017 for the title, resulting in backstage brawls between the two when they burst into each others interviews, which Harada in particular, seems to do), came to the ring. He didn't speak, but unlike HAYATA he didn't just point to the belt, Harada could tell from the look in his eyes he was challenging him.
Minoru Tanaka later set his own terms, he wants the title challenge to be in Yokohama on the  10th March, but gave no further details as to why this should be.

Their pre-matches were masterpieces of wrestling; Harada doesn't have bad matches, and neither does Minoru Tanaka. The title match has been granted, but Tanaka is yet to say just what his second "wish" will be.

Minoru Tanaka announced that his second wish would be for the title match to take main event spot at "Great Voyage in Yokohama" on March 10th 2019 at the Yokohama Cultural Gymnasium. This type of decision should be up to the champion, but at the time this is\was happening, the champion is a shy polite twenty-two year old boy (had it been Kenoh, Tanaka would probably have gotten a four letter word ending in "off" as a response), who isn't going to get involved. Daisuke Harada has not commented on it, although it would of course benefit him, and Naomichi Marufuji (the challenger to the GHC Heavyweight Championship) has told Tanaka that he is not having the main event.
After the match at Korakuen where Harada and Tanaka beat the blue hell out of each other, Marufuji went to shake Tanaka's hand, but Tanaka walked off in a huff.

The title match at "Great Voyage in Yokohama 2019" was preceded by the match signing in Yokohama on the 9th March. Tanaka spoke of his ambition to get the belt, this being his 25th year as a pro-wrestler, and also because it is the only belt he has not had yet (having held both the junior titles in All Japan and New Japan); Harada said that he wants to make the Noah Juniors the best in the world, and therefore the belt was staying with him, it is all very well and good for Minoru Tanaka to want the belt, but these things should really be done by a member of Noah.

The two of them put on a typically stellar match. Neither of them tend to have bad matches, but this one was off the rails, in terms of what they pulled out of the box. Minoru Tanaka, a man in his late 40s (but who has the body of a 22 year old), kept typical pace with Harada, and in the end defeated him for the title with a Fireball Splash. 

LINKS
Harada takes the GHC Junior, avoids RATELS break up, but YO-HEY betrayal
Daisuke Harada, captures the belt, and YO-HEY's furious attack
Daisuke Harada & Minoru Tanaka ~ GHC Junior Heavyweight match signing
Daisuke Harada mini interview

NEXT CHAMPION:  Minoru Tanaka 

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