[2008-04-08-AJPW-Championship Carnival] Osamu Nishimura vs Kensuke Sasaki

[Ma Stump Puller]

I'm usually quite iffy on Kensuke Sasaki's ring work and these two have had a real mixed range of matches in the past; some good, some real bad. Sasaki shows some good fundamentals but his real strength here is, well, his strength, and he uses that here to dictate the standing portions of the match with big meaty chops and bombs. Nishimura takes the advantage with smart positioning, working over Sasaki's leg with forearm smashes and Inoki-crab leg kicks, as well as locking in a nasty Muta Lock, excelling when Sasaki is off his feet and having to work on the mat, which is obviously not his bright spot. The pacing is solid and also rather realistic: Nishimura isn't going to be able to match Sasaki's strikes and knows this rather quickly himself after a failed exchange, instead getting him wrapped up on the ropes or on the ground where his striking is negligible, finding multiple ways of doing so despite getting chopped aplenty. Sasaki isn't the greatest seller but he knows how to get sympathy from the crowd and stay strong at the same time so it wasn't too bad this time, and it gets REALLY good when he's trying to get up from a ref count and Nishimura is hitting him with sick baseball slide kicks and stomps, eventually making a fiery comeback with a few power moves.

Sasaki dominates for a bit using some submissions and big shots to rock Nishimura until he counters with a Cobra Twist. Sasaki gets to the ropes and literally throws him out of the ring in the process. Eventually the dude goes crazy and hits a big dive to the outside (that almost gets botched due to him catching one of his feet in the ropes mid-dive, still recovers well) Nishimura hits a Spinning Toe Hold, they tease the tap out victory after a particularly long Figure Four, however Sasaki gets the ropes again. The last few minutes are pretty frantic as both men exchange some roll ups and finishers, with Sasaki's bad leg preventing him from capitalising proper on most of them despite landing flush. As a result, the bell sounds for the time limit draw before a winner can be made. This gets quite slow at points but I thought it wasn't that bad. I always get a bit annoyed when limb work doesn't come into play in a match (even just for a cool novelty spot, at least?) Sasaki does at least try to sell the effects of it when it matters, and Nishimura is always incredibly solid as the calculating old-school scrapper. There's some big shots here and the selling is very solid, building up suspense for a potential upset by Nishimura: never becoming too dramatic as to do the opposite. All in all, a solid highlight from the 2008 Carny.