Kobashi and Takayama retain their titles

[El Fiasco]

Results from the big NOAH show today, courtesy of www.puroresupower.com (I left all their comments in tact):

1. Haruka Eigen & Jun Izumida defeated Kishin Kawabata & Masaji Aoyagi in 11 minutes, 42 seconds when Izumida beat Kawabata.

2. Michael Modest & Donovan Morgan defeated Tsuyoshi Kikuchi & Mitsuo Momota in 9 minutes, 19 seconds when Modest used a Reality Check on Momota for the win. Referee Mighty Inoue ended up getting bodyslammed after the match.

3. Akira Taue, Naoki Sano, & Makoto Hashi defeated Scorpio, Bull Schmitt, & Vinnie Valentino in 18 minutes, 34 seconds when Sano used a Northern Lights Bomb on Valentino for the win.

4. Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Takashi Sugiura defeated KENTA & Yasuhiro Suzuki in 16 minutes, 46 seconds when Sugiura used an ankle-submission hold on Suzuki for the win.

5. Mitsuharu Misawa, Yoshinari Ogawa, & Masao Inoue defeated Takeshi Morishima, Daisuke Ikeda, & Naomichi Marufuji in 22 minutes, 4 seconds when Misawa gave Marufuji the Emerald Flowsion on the floor and Ogawa took the pinfall in the ring.

6. Jun Akiyama & Akitoshi Saito defeated Tom Howard & Steve Corino in 11 minutes, 6 seconds when Akiyama used an exploder on Corino for the win.

7. In the NWF Heavyweight Title Match, Yoshihiro Takayama defeated Takeshi Rikio in 15 minutes, 3 seconds with a German Suplex Hold. Takayama said after his match that he would look forward to doing a double-titles match with Nagata at the 5/2 Tokyo Dome show and that he would be interested in having a 3-crown of his own (GHC, NWF, IWGP Heavy). In an interesting comment, Takayama said that once he won the IWGP belt from Nagata that he would come back to NOAH and make NOAH his "home base" and go after Kobashi. That is in sharp contrast to Takayama showing more loyalty to NJ at the beginning of the year.

8. In the GHC Title match, Kenta Kobashi defeated Tamon Honda in 26 minutes, 55 seconds with a lariat for the win. Kobashi gave Honda a tremendous amount of offense in the match and did several near-finish (KO/fall) spots, including a head-drop style German Suplex and several submission holds. Chono showed up at ringside.

It sounds like Kobashi actually got a very good match out of Honda.

[GlobalHonored]

At first, looking at this card, I was a bit skeptical of these matches. But seeing the results and how Chono showed to push the 5/2 Dome match, I am excited about checking this show out when it becomes available. Takayama-Rikio is a good match-up and one I thought many people underestimated. Rikio has a good tough style that could work well with Takayama who likes to take a good beating before killing his opponent. 25 plus minutes out of Honda blows my mind. Kobashi's the man but wow!This may actually be good. I'll watch any Kobashi fight but of course wasn't expecting much here, but it does sound like the main event was more impressive than many thought it would be. Also Tag Champs versus Z1 Gaijins should be interesting. Howard's a beast and I Corino has old school charisma that tends to make his matches better than they should be. The WAVE stuff isn't too exciting but Marafuji/Ogawa/Misawa are capable of putting together some quality story-telling when in their together so that may be worth viewing as well. The JR Tag match also should provide some acrobatics to the card and who would wanna miss Eigen & Momota in action. My only criticsm: Where the hell is Rusher? I can't get enough of those killer head butts.

[El Fiasco]

Ya gotta love the way Rusher wears a NOAH apron to the ring.

Also, it says that after the Sternness vs. Zero-One bout, Akiyama fed Corino the new 'NOAH snacks' while Corino was unconcious. Anybody got any info on just what a 'NOAH snack' is? Sounds tasty.

[GlobalHonored]

NOAH snacks? Wearing Scary masks to the ring? Rrrret-RRRroo Rrrrrakirama