(NOAH) Naomichi Marufuji's statement

15th April 2020
Yahoo Japan

"Starting from this year, Pro Wrestling Noah has come under the umbrella of CyberAgent, and we are affiliated with DDT. However, we cannot access venues, so we are holding empty arena matches on DDT Universe and Samurai TV. Because I am a member of the company, I am receiving a salary, but in terms of wrestlers, the sense of crisis in the company is probably larger than their sense of crisis in the form of a salary, and of course if the company does not receive money, then the wrestlers will not. In this situation, we have to act now. Even if there is no limit to the part of financing such as internet broadcasting, and from the standpoint of attracting customers and performing, the company earns a lot of income, but as a result of that not happening, the part for the salary of both wrestlers and staff will eventually start to run out. Therefore, Kitani-san's request for this is appreciated by us, and I am grateful for this opportunity to give an opinion at this time as part of the entire industry.

I think that the genre of pro wrestling is still a narrow village, and I think there are still many people probably who do not know about it, or people who do not recognize it, but there is a connection with social media. There are many opinions from fans and those who are interested in pro wrestling, and who are energetic and courageous, and so I don't think that we should give up on such things. Now such a critical situation has come, so by all means I think that from Noah, to the pro wrestling world, Japan and the whole earth, pro wrestling is given to energize. I think that people who have seen wrestling feel strongly under such extraordinary circumstances, so we would like to continue to do it strongly. By all means, thank you for your consideration. "

Translated from Yahoo Japan