[1976-01-09-NJPW] Steve Wright & Otto Wanz vs Strong Kobayashi & Seiji Sakaguchi

[Jetlag]

This is interesting just because it's footage of Wright and Wanz from the mid 70s baby! The match wasn't much, because the japanese guys treated the europeans like nothing special at all. The match starts with the japanese guys working chinlocks on Otto which is not really what you want. Wanz and Wright tried to work as a heel team, double teaming the natives, but their attempts were thwarted. Wright didn't do any matwork or flashy stuff here, but you could tell from the way he moved and executed basic moves like a takedown that he was the real deal. Another interestig thing was Wanz throwing punch combos. He would bully his opponent into the ropes or corner, and then attack with shoulder blocks and fast punches, almost like a proto-Vader. Otto was a pretty good boxer before his wrestling days and still mobile at this point so he could throw some nice punches. A pity that none of this amounted to much of a match, but still cool to see the europeans in such unusual roles. Hopefully more of their 70s japan stuff can be unearthed.