Kotaro Nasu vs Yukito, Heat-Up 5/25
A very good little quasi-shootstyle match. Reminded me a lot of a Fu-Ten undercard match which is a very good thing in 2025. Yukito continues to be decent while Nasu continues to elevate things by being really vicious. He had some of the most vicious kicks and open hands I've seen all year in this. Him looking in a cool calf slicer and then going in further on Yukitos leg with brutal low kicks was quite good, poignant shootstyle action. There was also a nice punishing aspect since Nasu is the veteran so he is obligated to try and kick right though Yukito. It's really really fun and if it hadn't been for the somewhat awkward insertion of a few irish whip moves it would've been one of my favourite singles matches of the year. My man Nasu deserves more recognition (and more bookings so I can watch him more, dammit).
Sareee vs Chihiro Hashimoto, Sendai Girls 11/16
A no-brainer great match up that delivers pretty much what you expect. Still, I was pleasantly surprised by the opening half of this which was really good, smart pro wrestling. We get some cool matwork where Hashimoto shows off her Alexander Otsuka-ish cartwheels and granby rolls and what not, dominating Sareee in cool ways, then cutting her of with those massive body checks. It was great stuff. Sareee was fighting against a wall here, and she had to figure out how to get by and start bombing her with her signature crowbar dropkicks and stomps. Sareee then trying to break Hashimoto leg with nasty twisting legbars and diving stomps was quite great. Of course, that legwork was pretty much forgotten as soon as Hashimoto got back on offense. They have their obligatory 'we both no sell a suplex' moment and the match is a lot less interesting suddenly. Some Takaiwa-ish crowbar strikes, headbutts, bombs and lariats happen to get me back into the match. After some more trite no-selling we get at least a graceful finish. I really wonder if it's possible for a Japanese big match to exist these days without a bunch of suplex no-selling. Even the crowd seems bored of that stuff at this point. It's a slight let down because there was a bunch of objectively really great work here.
Shinya Aoki vs T-Hawk, GLEAT 10/9
As usual, Aoki provides plenty of entertainment toying with his opponent on the mat and trying to force his shoulders down for the pin in painful looking ways. T-Hawk knocking him off the top rope and then proceeding to bitch slap him around on the floor was some surprisingly adept brawling considering T-Hawk is a Dragon Gate guy. Still, I thought Aoki needs to learn how to sell. I get that he's supposed to be a monster but he shouldn't be making stupid faces after getting punched in the face. As such the end of the match was a bit underwhelming. Fair play to T-Hawk as throwing Shinya Aoki into a row of chairs and then bitchslapping him was probably the greatest thing he ever did.
AKARI vs Crea, PURE-J 5/16
Impressive 2/3 falls match between two skillful wrestlers. Crea is quite the fun hard hitting machine with her boots and chops and AKARI had lots of nifty lucha-esque takedowns and submissions attempts. Though Crea also had some good submission work of her own. There was some quite evil stomping and smacks to the face here. Really liked the struggle over the tarantula attempt. Creas jumping big boot thing that she does is awesome. The match felt gritty and most importantly, they fought really hard in all 3 falls and had an unpredictable match that had some thought put into everything down to how they built up things throughout all the 3 falls without going cookie cutter. Definitely felt like more people should have their eyes on these two. Admittedly, Crea could've done with a bit less slapping of the thigh, but other than this was great.
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