(NOAH) EVENT RECAP: SUNNY VOYAGE 2023 (Saturday March 25th, Iwate Morioka Gymnasium)

Noah continued the second day of their Tohoku tour by coming to Hi69's hometown of Morioka. Kenoh says that he too feels like a local as Sendai is the largest city in Tohoku, and Kenoh of course, is originally from Michinoku Pro which is based there. The big drama of tonight was the three bout main event and Shuhei Taniguchi going slightly off the rails much to the mystification of Takashi Sugiura. 

Today's event was not streamed live, and therefore I have more information on some matches than others. I am grateful to the local fans and the fans that travelled out from Tokyo for information, credit is given at the end. The event will be streamed on WrestleUniverse on Tuesday 28th March from 18:00 JST. You will need to be a subscriber to view. 

MATCH ONE

Kinya Okada vs Taishi Ozawa

Winner: Kinya Okada with a Boston Crab (7 minutes, 13 seconds)

MATCH TWO

STINGER (Yoshinari Ogawa, HAYATA & Yasutaka Yano) vs The Noah Junior Regulars (Atsushi Kotoge, Seiki Yoshioka & Alejandro)

Yoshinari Ogawa was photographed speaking to Yasutaka Yano, "with a slight smile on his face", while they were watching HAYATA in the ring. Yano listened seriously. Ogawa, however, was not so pleased when Yano lost.

Winner: Atsushi Kotoge with The Killswitch on Yasutaka Yano (13 minutes, 14 seconds)

Backstage, Atsushi Kotoge spoke of the "strong bond" between what was left of The Noah Junior Regulars which is now himself, Seiki Yoshioka and Alejandro with Harada retired, YO-HEY defected, AMAKUSA not part of them now as he is no longer Haoh and Junta Miyawaki in Mexico. Normally the words "Strong Bond" in the Noah Junior Regulars mean that someone is about to get screwed over in their misplaced concept of loyalty. 

MATCH THREE

Naomichi Marufuji & El Hijo Del Dr Wagner Jnr vs Funky Express (Mohammed Yone & Akitoshi Saito)

There was some El Hijo Del Wagner Jnr and Mohammed Yone comedy (I think Wagner pulled Yone's pose back at him)

Winner: El Hijo Del Dr Wagner Jnr with the Wagner Driver on Akitoshi Saito (12 minutes, 54 seconds)

MATCH FOUR

Masa Kitamiya, Daiki Inaba & Yoshiki Inamura vs Takashi Sugiura, Shuhei Taniguchi & Saxon Huxley

Shuhei Taniguchi using Takashi Sugiura as a weapon to attack with (he choke-slammed him on to Daiki Inaba), after the match (which he won), he yelled something like "Senior Sugiura! Let's unite", Sugi was a little angry at being used like this.

Winner: Shuhei Taniguchi with a face kick to Daiki Inaba (16 minutes, 26 seconds)

Backstage, Sugiura confronted Taniguchi about the chokeslam; 

Taniguchi: Okay!!

Sugiura: It's not "okay", you! You won, so that's good, but what about be? Mutherfucker, you threw me twice!

Taniguchi: Senior, we won today!! Let's run with this momentum!!

(Taniguchi kind of dances off happily, Sugiura looks at the camera)

Sugiura: Well, he won, so I gues it's okay...I guess he woke up a little

MATCH FIVE

Kaito Kiyomiya, AMAKUSA & Ninja Mac vs Lanzelot, Super Crazy & Xtreme Tiger

Winner: Lanzelot with the Samson Clutch on AMAKUSA (14 minutes, 15 seconds)

Lanzelot won the last pre match and backstage put AMAKUSA on notice, "AMAKUSA, this is the second time I've beaten you. Tomorrow, I'll beat you and take the belt!"

MATCH SIX

Best Out Of Three Falls Tag Match

Good Looking Guys (Jake Lee, Jack Morris, Anthony Green, YO-HEY & Tadasuke) vs Kongoh (Kenoh, Katsuhiko Nakajima, Manabu Soya, Hajime Ohara & Hi69)

Fans noticed that Tadasuke has added a bandanna to his costume, which I guess still fits in the rockstar persona. However, the match started with a brawl as Kongoh attacked GLG before the bell even rung and Jake got a kicking during the melee brawl outside the ring. During this time, YO-HEY fell the near the barrier and just like the Dove fans had said, his aftershave was commented on as "smelling really good".  

Hi69 had said that Tadasuke was a marked man in this match, but while he didn't get the pin over him, Tadasuke was targeted by Kenoh yelling at him as he kicked him, "What is GLG? Is this guy cool?", and even Katsuhiko Nakajima joined in. Tadasuke rebounded with a lariat screaming, "G! L! G!"

Results

BOUT 1 was won by Jake Lee over Hajime Ohara (Giant Killing, 15 minutes, 19 seconds)

BOUT 2 was won by Hi69 over YO-HEY (Rumika, 9 minutes, 23 seconds)

BOUT 3 was won by Kenoh over Tadasuke (PFS, 2 minutes, 53 seconds)

Katsuhiko Nakajima stood on the turnbuckle to watch Jake go, Jake grinned up at him before leaving. While all this was going on, Kenoh was shrieking on the microphone that Kongoh had won today and he was happy to show how strong Kongoh was "before these fucking bastards here in Morioka". Morioka was special to him, but there was someone else who Morioka meant a lot to; the local boy, Hi69. Hi69 promised that he will always be part of Kongoh, and when he returns here next, he will still be a part of Kongoh. He handed the mic back to Kenoh, who spoke some further words at the end.

At the end of the event, the local fans also helped out with packing up the arena i.e. taking away the chairs and packing them into caged pallet trolleys and sweeping up the arena. 

Backstage, Kenoh spoke some more. After taking a jab at Tadasuke, and asking him if he joined GLG because he wanted to be popular, Kenoh remarked there was another five vs five coming up with GLG on the 27th March and demanded that the match be changed to a Captains Fall, which he nominated Hi69 as the captain of Kongoh. 

Attendance: 297

With thanks to: Kei, Shinzan Lifetime Noah & Umahori81

Picture credit: Weekly Pro

Noah's next event: SUNNY VOYAGE 2023, Aomori Mutsu Maeda Arena, Sunday March 26th (will be streamed at a later date)