(NOAH) EVENT RECAP ~ HIGHER GROUND 2021 ~ Yokohama Radiant Halls (Saturday, January 16th)

"A burning main and semi"

New fans, old fans, fans who hadn't been to see Noah for a while, all came together today (albeit under circumstances which sadly dictate no cheering, only what Noah fans call "Deep Bass Stomping" and clapping), to help sell out Noah's event in Yokohama. Veteran visitors to Yokohama were surprised to find that due to the worsening situation of Corona, Noah have taken the additional step today of putting up a barrier, so fans are seated even further back from the ring. A barrier is rare for Yokohama.

No Kaito Kiyomiya today who is recovering post operatively after having a metal plate removed from his chin. 

The event today was not streamed live, but it can be viewed on WrestleUniverse from the 19th January. This will not be a free stream (although the GHC Junior Heavyweight Tag held today was via Periscope), so you will need to be a subscriber to view. 

MATCH ONE

FULL THROTTLE (Hajime Ohara, YO-HEY & Seiki Yoshioka) vs Junta Miyawaki, Yasutaka Yano & Kai Fujimura

There were four youngsters in this match; the three young boys who made a speedy entry to the ring (with Junta Miyawaki leaping over the ropes), and the much younger referee, who found himself in the unenviable position of dealing with Noah's chaotic junior division (he seems to be spared the grumpy heavyweights though). 

Yokohama got going in an energetic way from the first event with the young boys flying off the top turnbuckles, and later Fujimura and Yano using a double team move on Hajime Ohara, which was like a double Boston Crab with both of them holding a leg each. This was broken up by Yoshioka, but it wasn't to be the first or last time the much younger team threatened their seniors.   

WINNER: YO-HEY with the Facial G (11 minutes, 29 seconds)

YO-HEY with usual dance from the ring on leaving apparently, but not before he had held up three fingers to the young boy team as they passed FULL THROTTLE. Looks like a mini feud of seniors & juniors developing, and realistically, Junta Miyawaki is the only one who can win. 

MATCH TWO

The Anti Wrestlers Alliance (Akitoshi Saito & Masao Inoue) vs Yoshiki Inamura & Kinya Okada

I don't know if Masao Inoue's poor gouty toes were stamped on (probably not as both Yoshiki Inamura and Kinya Okada are too polite), but Okada and Inamura were certainly not too afraid to gang up on him and give him a double clothesline and then a backdrop. More seriously, Yoshiki Inamura and Akitoshi Saito had a series of big shoulder tackles, and there was a long hang time on Saito's holding brainbuster on Okada, it was so long that Inoue had to keep Inamura out of the ring.

Despite the rough handling he took from the much younger wrestlers, Inoue was not completely helpless, using his usual pins like sneak pins etc, but ultimately he was driven back by Yoshiki Inamura using Rikio's sumo attack and then almost put through the ring mat by the Musou. 

WINNER: Yoshiki Inamura with the Musou on Masao Inoue (10 minutes, 26 seconds)

Backstage, Inamura declared that the Musou would be hunting Jun Akiyama at The Nippon Budokan.

MATCH THREE

Mohammed Yone & Shuhei Taniguchi vs Kongoh (Katsuhiko Nakajima & Masa Kitamiya)

"The Aggression" or "Kongoh", call them what you will, were on form in this match; Masa Kitamiya challenging Mohammed Yone to a shoulder tackle, Yone pulling the "Disco Fever" and knocking him down, and then an unappreciative Kitamiya getting up and charging at Yone, bouncing off him once before he knocked him down.

Katsuhiko Nakajima was typically irritating, especially when Shuhei Taniguchi kicked him on rope break, and when Taniguchi went to throw him at the ropes on the opposite side of the ring, Nakajima held on to them instead of bouncing off. This later triggered "Monster Taniguchi", who slammed them both, and then later stood up after being soccer ball kicked by Nakajima and roared. However, fans were disappointed with the Yone-Taniguchi team, it wasn't really anything to do with Yone, more Taniguchi. Taniguchi attempted some kind of dancing, although it looked more like a jig than disco from what I could make out, but I think fans preferred it when he was a monster who attacked, and didn't waste time hopping around. 

WINNER: Katsuhiko Nakajima with the Vertical Spike on Shuhei Taniguchi (9 minutes, 36 seconds)

After their traditional fist to elbow bump in the ring, backstage, Kitamiya fumed against Takashi Sugiura, and Katsuhiko Nakajima made comments about how natural it felt to team together again...fans are waiting to see if this is going to lead to a Budokan tag title challenge. 

MATCH FOUR

The Sugiura Army (Takashi Sugiura, Kazunari Murakami & NOSAWA Rongai) vs Kongoh (Kenoh, Manabu Soya & Tadasuke)

Naturally, the champion and his challenger (i.e. Kenoh and Kazunari Murakami) started the match off, which began with Murakami taking Kenoh down to the mat, and then taunting him on several occasions afterwards, like when he was ordered to release the hold on the ropes. Murakami continued to get into trouble during the match, by repeatedly being told off for punching with a closed fist. He took no notice, and did it repeatedly. 

There was a shoulder tackle challenge between Manabu Soya and Takashi Sugiura, with Soya bouncing Sugiura around the ring. Remembering NOSAWA'S comments on it once, Sugiura turned to NOSAWA and sarcastically asked him if he had any advice that he wanted to give? Later, they had a test of strength, which made one fan comment that they looked as if they were two gorillas. 

The match ended with Murakami hammering on Tadasuke, who was lying flat on his back, before dragging him up after shoving the ref away, Kenoh tried to separate them but got knocked out with a closed fist punch.

WINNER: Referee stop as Kazunari Murakami choked out Tadasuke (16 minutes, 8 seconds)

After a face off between the two teams, Manabu Soya carried an unconscious Tadasuke from the ring, in the style that suggested he was going to Avalanche Slam in somewhere along the way. Fans want two things to come out of this match - for Kenoh to go to the Budokan as the GHC National Champion (the title match takes place at the next Noah show on the 23rd), and for Takashi Sugiura and Kazunari Murakami to team up. 

MATCH FIVE

GHC Junior Heavyweight Tag Championship 

STINGER (Yoshinari Ogawa & HAYATA) vs The Kongoh Juniors (Haoh & Nioh)

Noah streamed the match "guerrilla broadcast" by streaming it live and unannounced on Periscope. I don't know how long these stay up for (so if you are reading this some time after the event it may not be there still), but in any case the whole event will be put up on WrestleUniverse on the 19th January.

Kongoh were hungry for the belts and for the win and this permeated the whole of the match, their desire for the championships. It bought out the best in Nioh (who admittedly I haven't seen at this level for a few years), and it also bought out the best in HAYATA, who fans were saying was "independent" of Yoshinari Ogawa now. It seemed that perhaps Ogawa knew this too, but only after the match. During the match Ogawa was furious that someone had dared challenge him for the belts (it always makes him angry), and used tricks like using Yasutaka Yano as a human shield to prevent Nioh from diving outside the ring at him, grabbing Haoh by the hair when he bounced off the ropes, and sneak attacking Nioh in the few second interval when he complained to the ref about the pin. Nioh, however, can be just as devious as Ogawa (which is new), when he pretended to be dazed and crawling around before knocking HAYATA down. 

Haoh's arm was worked on by STINGER; HAYATA stamping on it, Ogawa introducing it to the steel ringpost a few times, and then the part where he looked as if he was going to rip it clean from its socket. 

Nioh's arm also came in for some attack, but not as badly as Haoh's was, with the main story between himself and HAYATA being that HAYATA was as desperate not to get pinned by him, as Nioh was to do the pinning and get a perfect three in both senses of the word.

WINNER: HAYATA pinned Haoh with the Rotating Cross (20 minutes, 40 seconds)

Then because this is the Noah juniors, and the law of chaos dictates that you can't have more than four in the ring without a fight breaking out, Yoshinari Ogawa was blindsided by NOSAWA Rongai, Kotaro Suzuki and Ikuto Hidaka storming the ring to beat him down, HAYATA was thrown from the ring as was Susumu (who had come to second them), and Kongoh slipped away to lick their wounds quietly. 

NOSAWA Rongai picked up the belts and handed one to Kotaro, and the other to Hidaka, and Kotaro spoke on the microphone and said "The next is Hidaka and I. You can't refuse. The place is the Nippon Budokan". Once again it was up to shy silent HAYATA to accept the challenge, which he did in normal fashion, saying "Next...you". 

MATCH SIX

"New Year Special Match Yokohama"

Go Shiozaki & Naomichi Marufuji vs Momo No Seishun (Daisuke Harada vs Atsushi Kotoge)

"Goodbye Kotoge's chest" 

(A watching Masao Inoue commented that Kotoge was chopped far less than he was)

Naomichi Marufuji bounced into the ring, and immediately went to Daisuke Harada, and asked him where his phone was. Harada scowled, and then went for the quick pin soon after the match started. 

While Daisuke Harada got his fair share of the chops handed out by Marufuji and Shiozaki, and even got the machine gun chops, Atsushi Kotoge was given far worse. But what Kotoge was handed out (chops which sounded like whips cracking from Shiozaki), he also gave back, headbutting Shiozaki who held his forehead for the rest of the match, and even in photographs on the way backstage for fans. Kotoge apparently made as loud a noise as the chops. The rest of the head trauma dished out was not of Kotoge's own doing; Go Shiozaki (who fans remarked is becoming more and more like Kenta Kobashi), removed the mats outside the ring and gave him a DDT to the concrete, and Naomichi Marufuji later gave him a piledriver to the apron. As well as the loss of whatever remains inside Kotoge's head, he was sent a red calling card thanks to being chopped between them, his chest matching his hair.

WINNER: Go Shiozaki with the Gowan Lariat on Atsushi Kotoge (24 minutes, 26 seconds)

Despite his sarcasm at the end of the match, and sliding the GHC Heavyweight belt to Harada, Marufuji was complementary about the fight that Harada had put up posting on his TWITTER that he was tired after the match, and if he were a junior himself now, he didn't think he would have been able to beat them.  Harada, however, posted that "each shot had echoed to the core of my body", and said that he had devised a plan but he was unable to carry it out. He wants to challenge the heavyweights again but when "the level goes up as a tag". 

Go Shiozaki made a speech on the microphone after the match. He spoke about returning to the Nippon Budokan and how he wasn't going to stop there. He wanted to see everyone there in good spirits and health. At home he took a picture with one of his cats, showing the marks that Kotoge had left on his forehead. 

With thanks to: Fujiwara Armbar, Abeshin, Tsurimesan, Naoki_Slam13, Kei, THE LEAVE

GIFS taken from Noah GHC

PICTURE Credit: PKDX

Noah's next event: Saturday 23rd January at the Osaka Edion Arena 2nd Stadium