DAMNATION (Daisuke Sasaki & Tetsuya Endo) vs. Dick Togo & Mike Bailey w/ Yasu Urano
Not sure what it is, but whenever Dick Togo is on the card, his matches stick out straight away on paper. And his tag partner is Mike Bailey. Weird partner, right? I think the match set up is really perfect for it. Sasaki can do the brawl stuff that Togo can indulge in on one side while Endo and Bailey have a kick ass match based around their athleticism, which they do. Bailey has some brutal kicks. Early on he did an axe kick that go Endo in the side of the ribs, making a terrible thumping sound. Sasaki was pretty great when he was being worked over by Bailey early on. Even though he is a real scumbag, him fighting out of the corner unloading shots like he was Ricky Morton was awesome. Togo was great whenever he got in the match. At one point, he got the fans really hyped before he and Sasaki clashed, and the sequence following where they went from Togo dominating on the mat to them exchanging headscissors ruled. Then the match moved into the final stretch that had an excellent struggle between Bailey and Endo with strikes, brutal aerial offence that seemed to be even better by just being off the mark at times. At the end, there was a nasty chair shot by Togo to the back of Endo, who was pinning Bailey at the time, that wrapped around his back and hit Bailey right in the face, splitting him open badly. Bailey to his credit kept on roling with the match with no problems with blood pissing out of his eyebrows. Ouch. Great match. Awesome performances by all. Mike Bailey especially. ****1/4
KO-D Tag Team Title Match: Bad Comi (KAI & Ken Ohka) (c) w/ Shota vs. Smile Yankees (HARASHIMA & Yuko Miyamoto)
Some good brawling on the outside that came with some great comedy with Shota trying to do a moonsault off the balcony onto HARASHIMA and Miayamoto but left stranded when Smile Yankees take control and head back to the ring. The match once it got goIng was really good. Some good double team moves with Smile Yankees doing their thing while KAI and Ohka try and survive. Simple match but effective. HARASHIMA beating on Ohka while KAI is cheering Ohka on is a sight to see. Not sure what it is but something about wacky promotions like DDT and Dragon Gate brings personality out of KAI who is virtually a robot every time I see him in All Japan or watch his W-1 matches. ***1/2
KO-D Openweight Title Match: Konosuke Takeshita (c) vs. Shuji Ishikawa
This was a typical big match with tons of build and escalation. The offence was stiff but the overall match felt dry and lacking in emotion. It hurts it. Ishikawa is great but he does need that energetic figure to play off and Takeshita in 2016 isn't it. At 20 years old, I didn't expect that either. Nevertheless, there was some good interactions and sequences thrown together. Ishikawa has great flash strikes. Takeshita was smooth as usual. ***1/4
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