[2002-10-05-Capture] Koki Kitahara & Daiyu Kawauchi vs Shoichi Ichimiya & Kazunobu Nakamura

[Jetlag]

I assume the main event is like the quintessential Capture match. Lots of wild swinging punches and kicks that connect with full force. Kawauchi, who I saw in his debut match at a 1998 KAGEKI show against Masakazu Fukuda would go on to work Osaka Pro as Hideyoshi and is now grizzled veteran GENKAI in Kyushi Pro, so he has quite the history of japanese indy wrestling. Kawauchi is good as the energetic youngster here with explosive takedowns and pummeling violently on the ground. Ichimiya who is some comedy character in DDT looks credible here as a heavyweight shooter. His super violent, quick assault on Kawauchi in the 2nd fall using the guardrail may have been the highlight of the match. His extremely vocal selling also added some more grit. Kitahara is as you expect. His punches and kicks were Ikeda level but I was also surprised how brutal his chokes (or choke setups) felt. He also got his "Kitahara is a bastard" moment when he kicked Ichimiya in his bandaged arm. The matwork here is mostly working punches from mount and has a really smothering feel to it, though there is the occasional submission attempt and the finish is a neat submission counter. The match is short enough so it totally works.