NJPW New Year Golden Series 1988 - Day 7 - 11/01/1988
Top Of The Super Junior I Match: Keiichi Yamada vs. Yuji Funaki
This was pretty badass. Pure grappling for the most part which we know suits Funaki and was Liger’s (Yamada here) preference as well. Basically these two played out everything they learned within the dojo in a heavily aggressive and quick manner. Bringing speed without sacrificing skill for it. They do some high spots on the floor before going to the finish. The senior Yamada wins the bout in 9 minutes. ***1/4
Big Van Vader & Masa Saito vs. Kengo Kimura & Tatsumi Fujinami
This was pretty lively. Vader seems more comfortable in his role within each match. He’s ditched the awful top part of his attire and shown off his big frame. He played the manic monster that destroys the ringside area, he is the destructive force that Fujinami struggles to deal with. Kimura does surprisingly better against him but the result remains the same. Saito put in a shift as a force to be reckoned with also. He threw the others around like they were nothing at times. Fujinami and Kimura worked good as a team like always but they are the underlings to Inoki, so naturally they drop the fall here. Good match though. ***1/2
Owen Hart & Steve Williams vs. Antonio Inoki & Nobuhiko Takada
This was more interesting than anything particularly good. Takada had the standout performance with the fans gravitating to him while Inoki did sweet fuck all on the ring apron. Misawa clearly learned that from Inoki. Williams was alright but Owen was in the match more so but Owen’s biggest trick was taking a ridiculous spinning bump on everything. Worth watching? If you are curious, yes. **1/2
AJPW New Year Giant Series 1988 - Day 10 - 13/01/1988
NWA International Heavyweight Title Match: Jumbo Tsuruta (c) vs. Abdullah The Butcher
This was a solid match but Tsuruta is suited to more bombastic matches rather than these 70s style heel matches that suit Abby. The blood letting was awesome and Abby looked strong on top, but Tsuruta felt repetitive when he was on offence. Felt like he kept doing the same thing over and over again. Very old. But his selling was good and as generally solid in his role. ***
NWA World Championship Wrestling - 16/01/1988
NWA World Television Title Match: Nikita Koloff (c) vs. Dick Murdoch
This was a cool TV match with Murdoch going the extra mile to do the bumping schtick and be as wild as he could be. With breaks and everything, this was shortened but that’s just like a lot of TV matches, so it’ll be hard to rate that against it. Nikita isn’t much of a worker but he follows Murdoch’s led well and they get a pretty fun match out of it, even if they mess up the timings of the finish. ***
NWA World Wide Wrestling - 16/01/1988
NWA World Tag Team Title Match: The Four Horsemen (Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard) (c) (w/JJ Dillon) vs Barry Windham & Sting
This was an awesome tag team match in its most traditional form. But despite its constant reuse, it rarely gets tiring for me. Especially when it's done as well as it was here. The early part of the match had a little bit of parity between the two teams with Windham getting the slight edge over Tully, but the Arn and Sting got in the ring, the momentum totally swung the challengers favour. Arn made Sting look incredible here but he was the real king. Him slowly backing up from Sting in order to draw Sting into the corner was masterful, but Sting caught wise to it and was able to beat up both Horsemen. Then through good team work and heel tactics the horseman gained their preferred advantage, and did some great work on top. The faces held their own though and got their shots in and seemed to be on their way to winning the belts before JJ Dillion tripped Windham over for the DQ. Chaos ensues and Lex Luger is down to help out only to be beaten up himself. Luger is hurt by this. Good angle, great match. ****
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