Mio Momono vs Miyuki Takase vs Sakura Hirota (WAVE 6/29/2021)
The ruleset for this match was really cool. Basically it’s like a gauntlet match where you just try to survive both opponents. It starts as a 1 vs 1 match, the loser goes out, the winner stays in and fights the next person, and the first to get two straight wins is the winner. I don’t really like 3 ways so just doing them as a series of singles matches with an overarching story is a win for me.
The first match up is Momono vs. Takase. I haven’t seen Takase before but she was a pleasant surprise. She doesn’t do any flimsy offense, she focuses on the more solid stuff like snug clotheslines and she has a really great leg drop. Momono is one of those really fast moving modern day workers with endless cardio who can go really hard. Thankfully she doesn’t do anything stupid either. The opening goings are very fast moving without being too much. Joshi often has the problem that they throw everything out right from the get go, that wasn’t the case her as they start dodging moves, battling over moves, eventually being able to take advantage and zone in on weak spots. That also avoided another typical problem in joshi – random offense. Very targetted offense by both of them. Even basic fairly basic stuff like a backbreaker or dropkick to the gut felt important because it was followed up. It made everything important especially in the context that this was going to be a long match and both of them would probably have to go again after the fall. Nothing mind blowing but it was a good warmup for what was to come.
However the main selling point of the match is the performance of Hirota. Sakura Hirota is 42 years old and she has been largely doing comedy for the past 20 years. However, in this tournament she got humiliated by rookie and that caused her to transform into a serious wrestler and kick ass. No imitation jokes from her at all in this, and man judging by her performance here you wish she’d wrestle like this more often. After some going here and there she basically challenged her opponent to a straight wrestling match and they grappled it out. It was compelling because while Hirota was game and motivated, she was still facing a much younger, faster and more athletic opponent. As a result Hirota had to give it her all and that she did. She busted out all these awesome suplexes, submissions and counters and had one awesome exchange after another. What I love about this match format is that everything can truly be a finish. The roll up stuff was really freaking good and really helped by the fact that you by a roll up as a finish in this context. Not that any finish done here was cheap, everything was extremely hard fought. Honestly some of the best exchanges I’ve ever seen, they were that fucking great.
So Hirota was absolutely amazing. She was the star of the match, no doubt, but the other two were fantastic also. I was amazed they went such a long time without going into overly dramatic overkill or dangerous spots. The match didn’t even have a dive and they kept pretty much the whole 40 minutes or so in the ring. I loved the constant focus on the roll ups and pin attempts. Momonos out of nowhere dropkicks ruled and Takases power based offense was crushing. Often in Japanese big matches you have a bunch of nothing for the first 20 minutes before the last 10 minutes turn into a dancy reversal fest. Here the opposite was the case as they started busting out the fire works pretty early, but kept them going in a believable way by focussing on slick pin attempts and submissions, before settling into an amazing 50/50 finish with both the last surviving participiants busting out some epic counters and battling for control while selling this like a battle on the last few hundred yards of a marathon.
So, there you have it. You basically had several awesome singles matches sandwhiched into one coherent narrative over a 40 minute stretch that never got boring and provided plenty of highly intricate wrestling, plus the amazing story of Sakura Hirota being the biggest wily veteran underdog badass you’ve ever seen. Execution was good, action was tight, no silly antics aside from one very well timed joke that only lasted 3 seconds and served the narrative. Best modern joshi match I’ve seen by a mile. Hell it’s one of the best matches in any era. This was absolutely fucking mental.
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