(NOAH) EVENT RECAP "HIGHER GROUND 2020" Night 3 ~ Fukushima Toyota Crown Arena Sub Arena, Sunday February 9th.

"The cold and freezing nights of Fukushima are hot and intense with NOAH wrestling"

Noah came to the Fukushima Toyota Crown Arena Sub Arena today, which with its sloping roof and stairway layout to the side, reminded Atsushi Kotoge of the now long gone Differ Ariake. I have to agree with him, especially from a picture that a fan took when leaving the venue, especially with the position of the stairwell and the lights being on in the evening.

Despite the snowy conditions, the stratovolcano Mount Bandai, was visible in Fukushima today. It was quiet though with no smoke plume.

NOSAWA Rongai filmed Takashi Sugiura swinging a chair around before the event started, and said he was getting ready for 4th March at ShinKiba (Sugiura is appearing at NOSAWA'S produce "Tokyo Love" in a streetfight Tornado Tag against the Brahman Brothers)

Hitoshi Kumano celebrated his seven years in wrestling, having debuted against Atsushi Kotoge at Korakuen Hall in 2013, but I am afraid I don't know whether the event was marked with flowers or not, as it's one of those times when I don't have too much information out of today's show.

MATCH ONE
Akitoshi Saito vs Kinya Okada

Okakin lasted longer than expected against Saito.

WINNER: Akitoshi Saito with the Sickle Death (9 minutes)

MATCH TWO
Tadasuke vs Haoh

This was originally meant to be HAYATA vs Haoh, but YO-HEY asked for the card to be changed, so Tadasuke swapped with him. Haoh sadly, was not really much of a match for what is the steamroller like Tadasuke.
Kenoh was apparently watching.

WINNER: Tadasuke with the Outkast (10 minutes, 49 seconds)

MATCH THREE
Hitoshi Kumano & Junta Miyawaki vs Kongoh (Kenoh & Yoshiki Inamura)

As expected, it was Junta Miyawaki who got the worse of Kongoh today, being kicked by Kenoh and thrown around the ring by Inamura.

WINNER: Kenoh with ankle lock submission on Junta Miyawaki (10 minutes, 42 seconds)

MATCH FOUR
The Sugiura Army (Takashi Sugiura & Hajime Ohara) vs Kongoh (Masa Kitamiya & Nioh)

Hajime Ohara turned to the audience and said "Camera! Camera!" when he had Nioh in a face-lock on the ropes, and posed for pictures (yesterday when he had Minoru Tanaka in the Mui Bien, Tanaka screamed "no pictures!"). Sugiura also joined in!

Said to be a good tag between Takashi Sugiura and Hajime Ohara, Ohara very entertaining.

Ohara had Kitamiya in a hold outside the ring, preventing him fro getting in, while Sugiura slammed Nioh for the win.  Match said to be very good.

WINNER: Takashi Sugiura with the Olympic Slam on Nioh (17 minutes, 33 seconds)

MATCH FIVE
STINGER (Yoshinari Ogawa, Kotaro Suzuki & Atsushi Kotoge) vs RATELS (Daisuke Harada, HAYATA & YO-HEY)

YO-HEY termed this match as "Revenge" after changing the card yesterday, and indeed this match was planned to be the highlight of the evening given the story behind it, and the bitterness between RATELS and STINGER. However, in the early stages of the match, HAYATA had to be helped to the back by Tadasuke and one of the seconds. I am unsure of the details of what happened (don't worry, he's conscious), but I believe that whatever happened, happened after an encounter with Kotaro Suzuki when HAYATA fell outside the ring. The match wasn't stopped (although Harada was seeing to him outside of the ring), and it was left to Daisuke Harada and YO-HEY to carry on. Ironically, it was at this venue last year that Atsushi Kotoge was injured.

WINNER: Double count out YO-HEY & Atsushi Kotoge (18 minutes, 18 seconds)

Harada bent over Yoshinari Ogawa holding the GHC Junior Heavyweight belt after the match looking angry. Harada says that Ogawa cannot run from him anymore, he is going to push for the title match at Korakuen Hall.

As far as the HAYATA status goes at the time of writing, Noah have not announced anything (YO-HEY hasn't either and none of the others in RATELS have said anything much), and I am unsure if HAYATA (or even YO-HEY) came out after the event was finished to sign autographs.

MATCH SIX
AXIZ (Go Shiozaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima) & Mohammed Yone vs Kaito Kiyomiya, Shuhei Taniguchi & Masao Inoue

Masao Inoue is an old man with gout and naturally Katsuhiko Nakajima took advantage of this by stamping on his toes. Inoue did it back to him. However, despite Inoue's harassment at the hands of AXIZ (at least there is a break in cyberbullying as Takashi Sugiura has not currently returned to Twitter), it was Kaito Kiyomiya who got Nakajima's rope choke.
Match was said to be a funny one, not least because of MASAO WORLD, but also because Mohammed Yone went to use the "Disco Fever" pose to scare Shuhei Taniguchi. It didn't work.

WINNER: Go Shiozaki with the Gowan Lariat on Masao Inoue (22 minutes, 14 seconds)

Shiozaki gave a speech after the match, basically repeating what he said yesterday about dying Noah his colors in its 20th anniversary year.

ATTENDANCE: 
WITH THANKS TO: NJ45, Dragon, akm.fox.red, 
PICTURE CREDIT: Atsushi Kotoge, Noah GHC, Daisuke Harada
NOAH'S NEXT SHOW: Sunday 16th February, Korakuen Hall, Tokyo