[2000-07-16-AJW] Etsuko Mita & Mima Shimoda vs Nanae Takahashi & Momoe Nakanishi

[soup23]

There is certainly a structure to these LCO tags and I understand they can get long winded given how long and established the team was overall. However, much like Brock Lesnar in current day where the business side and ramfications can be examined in a negative light, the aesthetic of just what I am watching on my screen make me still really love the way they attack each match and make it feel like a full fledged war. This was their best performance so far this year as they are just vicious vs Takahashi and Nakanishi and give them no respect throughout the entire match. Momoe is a bloody mess and the match has a simple but visceral story of the true underdogs trying to overcome the vicious ring lords. Every near fall was given great gravity and you could see Momoe and Nanae inching closer and closer to an upset until it finally happened in one of the more endearing moments throughout all of 2000 so far. A fantastic match an end to a couple of days of LCO work. ****1/4 (8.7)

[ohtani's jacket]

This was a nice piece of booking. On paper, the NANA*MOMO team were helplessly outmatched by the experienced LCO team. Throughout the bout, LCO had the advantage but they couldn't put the younger girls away and every time Nana or Momoe kicked out it gave them a glimmer of hope. The first time I watched this I was bored with LCO. I ended up getting distracted and didn't make it through to the end so I wound up watching it from the beginning again. LCO's heel work was more engrossing the second time 'round which led me to believe that my enjoyment of the average LCO brawl depends on my mood or how much wrestling I've watched that day. They're not an act that makes me take notice but what I did notice about this match was that Shimoda looked far better working with Momoe and Nana than she did working with Watanabe and Maekawa. Shimoda can be sloppy at times and shows a lot of daylight but with these girls her work looked snug. One of the reasons the dynamic worked was that Nana had a Taue-like vibe to her work. Taue probably isn't the best example, in fact, you could probably use Jumbo Hori instead. But by being a bigger girl she could negate the advantage that Mita brings to LCO matches with her height. Then you had a bloodied Momoe being a dynamo and bringing a ton of energy to the bout to offset the rudo ring generalship of Shimoda. This wasn't an iconic match because Joshi was in a down period but it did produce one of the endings that only seem to happen in Joshi matches -- that raw emotion that perfectly summarizes the passion on display. This was good enough to slot in behind Aja vs. Satomura as the second best Joshi match of the year, IMO.