Ito Dojo - Kaoru Ito Debut 20th Anniversary 10/25/2009

     Ayumi Kurihara vs Ayako Sato

Really fun, scrappy joshi opening match. No choreographed sequences or waiting for the other person to get in position which is always refreshing to see, they both just went for dropkicks and armbars. There was also some matwork that actually felt like two people fighting rather than going through the motions. Sato was really straightforwardly solid with her quick dropkicks, while Kurihara was obviously set to be a big prospect in the joshi scene. There was one really fast sequence of pin attempts that they pull off insanely well. True to joshi form, the finish is Sato kicking out of one Uranage suplex, so Kurihara would hit her with 4 in a row and then force the pin like an olympic match. Miss these kinda joshi undercard matches.

Manami Toyota & Jaguar Yokota vs Aki Kambayashi & Shu Shibutani

Can you believe Jaguar Yokota was 48 years old and a 32 year vet here? She was still moving pretty smooth. Toyota is like in any other match of hers that you’ve seen, just hitting her spots. Front dropkick, armdrag from the ropes, rolling cradle, you know the deal. She could still fly around but it’s less impressive when she’s teaming with Yokota who moves better and can actually work while being much older. Shibutani got popped by an elbow in the mouth early on, causing her to bleed and it made her powering through the rest of the match a bit more interesting. Shu and Aki (who is Miss Mongol of all people) were outmatched early on but they had a few fun ways to get in some offense on the legends, and it made the match more interesting than had it been even steven. Aki looked energetic but then her big spot was a bronco buster. They actually end up losing to one of those double submissions and now that’s damning.

Etsuko Mita & Mima Shimoda vs ZAP-I & ZAP-T

The ZAPs feel rather bizarre looking back. My guess is they were an attempt of AJW to recapture the spark of Gokuaku Domei, but obviously that wasn’t going to work. They both seem like they could be folklore creatures, like urban monsters or something. Anyways this was pretty fun and kinda delivered more than you’d expect. Action was solid with lots of brawling and weapon shots but also enough in-ring stuff to not feel lazy. Shimoda still has her working boots on busting some cool axe kicks and a big flip dive that was pretty crazy from someone who was basically semi-retired at this point. I think one of the ZAPs is a Kaoru Ito because she hits a sick double stomp and the other one only hits Blue Thunder Drivers. 

Takako Inoue & Tomoko Mori & Yumiko Hotta vs. Cherry & Hanako Kobayashi & Noriyo Tateno

Craptastic match unfortunately. The previous match actually did well as a brawl, here they tried to have all action but nothing looked good or had gravitas. Mori and Kobayashi tried to have a section in the middle with Kobayashi bleeding but they looked painfully mediocre. Hotta looked pretty immobile and checked out as she tends to do in her late career matches. Not good, not good at all.

 

Aja Kong vs Kaoru Ito, Ito Dojo

Pretty insane, violent and gory match. Pretty much just two tough middle aged ladies out to destroy each other and it was glorious. Ito has such violent offense that fits perfectly in a kind of reckless brawl. Her double stomps – including double stomping Ajas arm – were downright insane. Her bladejob was also amazing as she looked like she got shot in the eye. Kong was freakin gold here – as we all know her. She looked great both beating on a bleeding Ito, shoving her elbow into the cut, hitting her with the point of umbrellas, as well as taking some downright insane punishment from Ito. Her selling was fantastic as she really looked like she was falling apart. It wasn’t exactly Baba vs Destroyer but there was a bit of strategy at play with Ito trying to take out the arm. Loved Aja desperation kneecapping Ito and locking in a submission to regenerate a little. This will probably mainly be appealing to fans of violent bloody matches but for that it was pretty A+.

The Library

2025 Matchguide: Addendum #3

 Sareee & Takumi Iroha vs Kaoru Ito & Tomoko Watanabe, Ito Dojo 10/16

Oh look it's an Ito Dojo match! This is so unlikely but it's a ton of fun. Ito and Watanabe are way over the hill, but they still have enough energy to go all the way with Sareee and Iroha. A big part of the fascination of this match is 'Will they..?' and yes they totally will. Ito and Watanabe are still bumping and taking all of the hot young guns big offense. We do get to see Ito crush people with her big uranage and double stomp. In some ways you can see a wrestlers true talent when they are fat and old and Watanabe and especially Ito were still able to work entertaining exchanges. I would've liked the match to have a bit more of Ito/Watanabe clobbering the smaller two and working like the Twin Towers/Nigerian Nightmares but as it is this a ton of fun.

Mad Dog Connelly vs Isaiah Broner, NAP 1/12

You know maybe I should just watch as much Mad Dog Connelly as possible. To me the best of US wrestling is that Wahoo McDaniel, Buzz Sawyer, Dick Murdoch, Johnny Valentine gritty brawling stuff, and the Mad Dog Connelly is probably the closest you get to that vibe in the modern scene. This was just two mean tough looking dudes wailing on each other and throwing each other around. The bumps on the floor were pretty insane and felt very bar fight-esque. Very little fancy just straight up punishment. I loved how gnarly the last few strike exchanges felt, and the unhinged doctor bomb from Connelly. Could have done with out  the distraction finish but sometimes it just goes like that. No moment wasted here, a starkly straight forward affair without much fancydoings or obvious showmanship making this stuff a cool standout in the modern landscape.

Ali Najima vs Kazuhiro Tamura, HEAT UP 11/15

This looks like a good match up, and fuck yeah it is a good matchup. Najima is pretty much on top when it comes to being a reliable worker in 2025, for a rookie with a little over a year of experience he can do no wrong and he works this main event like a piece of cake. I would have liked them to go full on shootstyle but we just get a bit of shootstyle tinge in an indy match. The matwork is fun, Tamura is kind of a U-Style guy that never was in U-Style and he would not let himself be shown up easily. The match has lots of fun tricked out stuff, cool limbwork and neat pin combos. It's really enjoyable without overstaying its welcome. The beginning was kind of filmed like it was a 2009 livestream and they changed the camera settings midway into it so we don't get to see the transition to Tamuras legwork, which is a bit regrettable, but otherwise this is good all around.

Jun Kasai vs El Desperado, NJPW 6/24

A deathmatch that has amassed quite a lot of praise, even getting a **** 3/4 rating from pro wrestlings #1 authority on what's good and what isn't.  How so? My guess is because it's a) in NJPW, so more people watched it and b) it's absurdly long and delivers spots, spots and more spots at a consistent pace. Don't get me wrong, it's a well worked and entertaining match with most of the big bumps feeling like important transitions, but it definitely feels like something that I've seen Jun Kasai do a million times. All the respect in the world to the man that he can still do this kind of gorefest without problem at the age of 50, and there's definitely an allure to watching him do his thing, but there was 0 element of surprise in this. Desperado is rocking the Yamakawa pants and technically he should act like this kind of bloody spectacle is beneath him as an NJPW guy, but that element is not really felt at all. So you get your forgettable brawling segment, your lighttube carvings, your moves into broken glass, all feeling entirely predictable. Deathmatches used to feel dangerous - with fans genuinely not wanting to see their favourite wrestlers fall into barbedwire and such - and Jun Kasai taking a broken lighttube to someones face feels about as expected and welcome as a politician picking up and kissing a baby at a rally. There were still a few deathmatches even in 2025 that felt ghoulish, visceral, repulsive, hate filled and demented, but this was not quite that, it was pretty much the Jun Kasai 'can he stll do it -yes he can' rally for me. If you've never seen Jun Kasai before it's probably mindblowing for you so you can just take this review as the pointless musings of an out of touch old man. All that said I mainly didn't need this to be 30 fucking minutes long.

Tachishon Crazy vs Hinjaku Ningen Casshern, AZW 10/13

AZW delivers - better late than never! This was refreshing and a ton of fun. Almost like a mat spotfest as both guys seemed to try to outdo each other with nifty reversals and entries into submissions or pin attempts. Early scientific wrestling exchanges were really fun, they even seemed to knick some things from French Catch.Made me think maybe we should see Casshern in a promotion like Mutoha, locking up with someone like Dekai Ichimotsu or Yasushi Sato? Maybe I'm seeing things but I thought he has gotten quiet good by now, the execution problems he's had in the past not being there anymore and his selling in this being really good. And he's really one of the better octopus hold users still around. This Tachishon Crazy guy was also quite decent and a good antagonist. Really liked how he stayed on Casshern early on working him over with quick attacks on the ground and he had a few cool ways to get out of Cassherns octopus hold attempts. AZW guys when they're on will deliver some of the funnest wrestling you can imagine and this was another nifty match in their catalogue.

Dekai Ichimotsu & Great Zako vs MAD APE & Insect #2, XGF 11/23

Our heros Ichimotsu and Zako gather in the hellish battlefield of XGF to be attacked by two weird monsters. So it's everything that's right with pro wrestling by default. Ichimotsu is a lot of fun here, putting on wrestling holds on the freakish insect and bare knuckle punching him from mount. Besides Ichimotsu the other guys don't do a ton, Insect #2 didn't do any of the freakish antics that made him kinda fun before, and Mad Ape feels very much like just a guy. Still there's a few fun moments throughout, at one point they set off some firecrackers with Zako doing a heroic job rolling around in the tiny explosion like he was a guy getting turned into cheese in a vietnam movie. There's also things like a giant swing on the pavement, and Ichimotsus piledriver on the concrete was plenty sick. It went a little long but it's worth watching if you are into the griminess of XGF.

2025 Matchguide