[2000-01-03-AJW] Manami Toyota & Miho Wakizawa vs Tomoko Watanabe & Kumiko Maekawa

[soup23]

This suffered from being another crowd brawl at the start. By this point, I was checked out on that spot. When the match settled down, it became real interesting. The action was fierce but stuff was done with purpose for the most part and little touches like Toyota being rolled out of position on the figure four so Wakizawa couldn’t save her with a dive were nice touches. The Miho and Toyota tandem worked well together and I was unfamiliar with Miho and Kumiko’s work for the most part. The first fall progressed with pinfall attempts to bombs and finally Kumiko putting away Miho with some kicks. Second fall starts as more of the same as the Maekawa/Watanabe team is dominant over Miho hitting Fisherman Buster’s for nearfalls and some stiff kicks. Miho has one second to tag and lunges for it. I have liked Manami in this match as the most established person overall by far. Maekawa’s kicks are thrown with real abandon but they don’t always connect very flushly making the match suffer. Toyota and Wakizawa do stereo dives where they climb the entranceway to a section of Korakuen. That was a neat spot although I have had again enough with the crowd brawling especially in this match where it has happened twice. Watanabe and Kumiko take back over and hit a brutal kick/powerbomb combo to almost put Toyota away. Miho saves Toyota and they are able to win the second fall with a missile dropkick/electric chair bridge combo. Third fall starts with a good bit of desperation. Toyota accidently hits Miho from the top rope and is barely able to make the save on the pin attempt. The third fall is a full out sprint and Watanabe picks up the pinfall on Miho after an assisted kick from Kumiko. Afterwards, LCO challenges them which should be fun to watch after their domination earlier. I liked this but it never hit the next gear to become great and Kumiko and Miho took me out of the match to a degree. ***

[Loss]

This was really fun, really joyful wrestling. Miho Wakizawa, who looks to be about nine years old, is very much in awe of her tag team partner and seems like she would follow Toyota to the moon. I'm going to say something I've never said about a Toyota match -- the execution was off at times, but they made up for it with some great psychology, and I loved the basic story here. When Toyota is in, the match is mostly in their control. Every time that an overzealous Miho tries to help her, she ends up setting them back. So Toyota is trying to mentor Miho while still holding off a formidable team in Watanabe and Maekawa. I don't have much use for Maekawa's samey offense with the constant scissors kicks that are executed more like paper cutter kicks, but I have always liked Watanabe as someone with offense really unique to her within the Joshi world. I was all ready to lecture them about going outside just like I have every other match that has had crowd brawling this year, but they paid it off in a cool way, with a nice visual of both Toyota and Wakizawa doing stereo planchas, Miho following Toyota's lead in doing so. Speaking of payoffs, I also like how the second time Toyota and Miho did the Irish whip on Watanabe and she attempted the same counter that took them both down the first time, they were prepared for it. So Miho may be an annoying little shit, but she's also capable of growth. And what else can we ask from fourth graders in wrestling matches, really? This felt really unique and had some cool layers to it. Toyota has "slowed down", but only in the sense that she's working much smarter. **** for me -- I feel like that's probably overrating it a little, but this was a charming little match.

[soup23]

Maekawa is still pretty dreadful in this match on 2nd watch but I excused her inefficiencies and focused more on how well Toyota and Miho worked as a team. As a result, I liked the match more this time around even though it could have used some editing. ***1/2

[Laney]

I have to say that I didn't really enjoy this match too much on first glance, but it is one that I enjoy more after spending time to analyze it. This was sloppy in a few spots, but it really went with the flow of the match and the desperation of gaining a pin. I also very much enjoyed the structure of the 2/3 falls. None of the falls seemed like a waste, which can be a major detriment in these types of matches. The first fall was structured like it was a one fall match with both teams giving it all to gain the fall so that they could have the upper hand. The importance of winning the falls was kept throughout, with the third fall being fairly short, but this makes perfect sense given the exhausting effort put into the first two falls.

 

Still the negatives are still there in this match. I was not a fan of two separate crowd brawling sections. Maekawa seemed one dimensional with the same repeated offense. I think they could have had a better match if they cut out the crowd brawling and tightened it up to a shorter match.

 

Overall, the good outweighs the bad. ***1/2

[cramerjason87]

Tons of nearfalls done at a fast pace. There was a few good sequences but this could have been much better if it was only the first fall. The sloppiness didn't bother me as much as the excess.

[Karl]

I really liked how the match built, with the long first fall and much shorter last two. As always, super stiff match with a lot of things to like about it for me. ***3/4

[puropotsy]

Watanabe and Maekawa come off as a fun tag team here. The double planchas off the entrance by Toyota and Wakizawa were really great. I loved the Japanese Ocean Cyclone Suplex/Missile Dropkick combo to win the second fall, one of my favorite things I've seen in a while. The third fall made the match with a fast past and Toyota trying in vain stave off the attack on Wakizawa. I sense from the post-match that Watanabe and Maekawa have a showdown with LCO coming but it doesn't seem to be in the footage from January 2000, hope we get to see it

[aethelred]

I thought this was superb actually. Miho Wakizawa was really good in her role, looking forward to the next time we see her.

[ohtani's jacket]

I liked this a lot. It was a fairly standard Joshi tag, but I didn't mind that so much since at least it was traditional. All Japan Women's roster had thinned out at this point and it was clear that there wasn't going to be any uptick in business with the likes of Maekawa and Watanabe being pushed (notice how immediately more exciting things are when a charismatic team like LCO show up to challenge the new champs post-match), but there was a brief revival in AJW's in-ring product around this time and I thought all four women put a strong foot forward in terms of ring work. On the message boards there were some pretty savage arguments vis-a-vis GAEA vs. AJW. I wonder which side PWO2K will take. Everyone nailed their role in this. Miho was super earnest. Toyota was like a mother wolf. Maekawa was pesky and unlikeable. And Watanabe looked like she was measuring herself against Toyota the entire time. The second crowd brawling spot was the only time I felt like groaning. Aside from that it was engaging, especially considering the length.

[Matt Franklin]

This was fun. Miho's enthusiasm in her role was great, and while she was the obvious weak link she showed good fire. I didn't mind Maekawa as much as others seemed to, while some of her kicks were off I thought her chemistry with Miho was actually kinda cool. Dug the finish with the over-the-shoulder tiger driver/scissor kick combo, very definitive. I thought Toyota looked good in this match, not as go-go-go as much of her 90's work. I haven't seen much of her post 95ish, so it will be interesting to see her more in this later stage of the career. ***1/2

[Stiva]

I enjoyed this and, like said, found it really engaging for its length. The second crowd brawling spot seemed a tad superfluous but the in-ring work and story were both excellent. I thought Miho was the standout as young girl trying to make an impression and show herself off but all 4 were really good at their roles. I agree that Maekawa's offense was pretty poor throughout but I thought she showed some good work, kicking about Miho and she cut a good pace herself down the stretch. Fun tag match that also set the seeds for the future at the end.

[jiraffejustin]

While this match doesn't seem to be anything that will change your life, it is still a lot of fun. I could do without the crowd stuff, the shrieking, and a various bits of wonkiness in execution, but those are minor hindrances to an otherwise enjoyable experience. If Miho wasn't doing all that shrieking, I think she would have been my favorite performer in the match. I like her spunk, her quickness, and her getting axe kicked on top of the head. The way she would go for those quick flash pins were a lot of fun. Some of the logic in these tag matches doesn't add up to me still though. I don't understand why every time the opposing team's corner member runs into the ring, the other team's doesn't do the same. Especially considering everybody comes into the ring from the corner at some point. That's also a bit of a minor quibble though.