Kobashi vs. Sano

[edgehead1984]

What do you think about this match which will take place on the 25th?? It will be in all probability a Kobashi win, but will it be a great match????

[Pheonix_Chi25]

Well,
I know about Sano's matches with Liger, so I expect Sano and Kobashi to go all out. Kobashi will win, but Sano will give him hell.

[Luds]

It should be a great match. A sure win for Kobashi, but still...

[The Franceman]

Kobashi will win for sure but this match musts reput Naoki Sano on the top of Jr divison just for awhile.

[Jason]

It sounds like you guys haven't seen much of Sano's recent stuff. He is definitely not a junior anymore, nor is he anywhere near the caliber of a wrestler that he was back when he feuded with Liger. However, he did have a suprisingly good match with Misawa last June, so I would expect Kobashi to be able to get a fairly decent match out of him. I'd guess somewhere from 3 to 3 and a half stars.

[GlobalHonored]

Sano can still get it done. Yeah, it's been quite a few years since that Liger feud. Sano was rather good in the 90s despite being black-balled by the major feds for joining Tenryu's $W$. Still, depsite that debacle, he got it done for several promotions, and in UWFI he was great IMO. Since Misawa let him back into the "big-time" when NOAH came about, Sano seemed to have grown lazy and a bit chubby. He couldn't find his role and didn't seem to fit in anywhere. But over the past 6 months Sano has really stepped it up, he looks in shape much like his mid 90s days, and is putting on some good matches with the pro/shoot style. He has teamed up lately with a better cast of allies including Taue & Ikeda. He works well with the style of Ikeda & Yone and Taue offers that legendary presence. Now with Koshinaka in the mix, he has another worker that he can build a feud or alliance with, a guy that can really fit into his style.

As far as the Kobashi match goes. Well, Kobashi wins, probably in less time than lately (sub 25 minutes) but he'll probably take a lot of stiff shots from Sano, maybe a few near falls, but will be too strong for Sano to put away and then finish him. I really enjoy Sano's work and hope that this will officially spark his revival. With Honda stepping it up, and Bison looking strong lately (both have their Title losses to thank for much of that), Sano hopefully will be next in line to step it up a notch and enter the upper-echelon of NOAH.

[edgehead1984]

well no surprises Kobashi won, here's the results.

1. Mitsuo Momota beat Haruka Eigen (7:22) with a horizontal cradle.
2. Bison Smith & Donovan Morgan beat Jun Izumida & Kotaro Suzuki (14:02) when Morgan used the Sayonara on Suzuki.
3. Takeshi Morishima, Takeshi Rikio & Tamon Honda beat Masao Inoue, Akitoshi Saito & Masashi Aoyagi (17:16) when Honda used the rolling Olympic Hell II on Aoyagi.
4. Naomichi Marufuji & KENTA beat Richard Slinger & Juventud Guerrera (18:33) when Marufuji used the Shiranui on Slinger.
5. Jun Akiyama & Yoshinobu Kanemaru beat Akira Taue & Makoto Hashi (17:28) when Kanemaru used a revolution-style brainbuster on Hashi.
6. Mitsuharu Misawa, Yoshinari Ogawa & Scorpio beat Daisuke Ikeda, Mohammed Yone & Tsuyoshi Kikuchi (16:05) when Scorpio used a 450 splash on Kikuchi.
7. GHC Heavyweight Title: Kenta Kobashi (c) beat Takuma Sano (25:58) with a brainbuster (6th defense).

I didn't know Kobashi used a brainbuster...

[DANGEROUS DAN]

Anyone find it ironic that this is the same finish to the Kawada-Tenryu bout?

[edgehead1984]

Never thought of that, but I think you might be on to something...

[Luds]

Well Sano isn't very heavy... So Brainbuster can look very spectacular!

[Luds]

Well Sano isn't very heavy... So Brainbuster can look very spectacular!

[edgehead1984]

Nice double post Luds.

[Pheonix_Chi25]

I see I wasn't the only one who saw that the finish was like Kawada-Tenryu.

What is a Revolution Brainbuster? Excellent match with Sano-Kobashi, who's next for the GHC Championship?

[Luds]

You know we can't post twice within the same minute edgehead, so don't blame me, blame the server who screwed up and posted the asme post twice

[GlobalHonored]

Attendence for the show was an incredibly low 2800 reported at the 8000 seater Kobe World Hall. And TV ratings were poor too. So no one rally gave two sh*ts for Sano's challenge. NOAH doesnt draw well outside their Tokyo "Home Bases" but 2800 is bad, although the entire card was really really weak. Poor "Big Show" booking for Misawa in terms of card quality and venue. I suppose he was just hoping to strike it lucky and have people come out to see that one match(only real decent match on entire card) no matter that they all knew who would win in the end.

NOAH's done well lately with Kobashi matches. Perhaps Sano just doesn't get the fans love or respect, and maybe never will in NOAH as he's got a different style and spent the 90s in UWFI/SWS/Kingdom and shoot type promotions not their beloved All Japan 90s or even New Japan were they would have seen more of him. I haven't heard anyone say it was a good match from a quality standpoint either. Kobashi has had terrific matches so far no matter who his challenger has been (Ogawa, Bison, Honda) and really put on a show with those men, surprisingly so, which would make it a huge disappointment if the Sano match was poor, b/c you know they could have done better. I haven;t seen it yet, but will surely soon enough. Taue and Kobashi will do a good gate at Budokan no matter what with their history and reputations. Hopefully Taue can give it his all as in the Nagata match where he looked like the Taue from 5 years ago and not what we've seen lately.