#NJPWAus Melbourne results (Feb. 17th from Festival Hall)
NJPW are using local rings and some local crews for this tour, this show included using the Melbourne City Wrestling (MCW) ring, ring announcer, referees, and camera crews (photos).
Now let me just state for many Australian Wrestling fans, especially Victorians, Festival Hall was at one stage our major wrestling venue, just like NJPW’s “Korakuen Hall”; ECW’s “ECW Arena”; WWE’s “Madison Square Garden”. For many, especially the older generations, Wrestling at Festival Hall is synonymous with the Golden Age of Professional Wrestling in Australia, once dubbed the “House of Stoush” due to the amount of high profile boxing and wrestling it held. During the 1960’s & 1970’s many Australians would gather around the television at noon on weekends and tune into TV Ringside on channel nine. World Championship Wrestling was a who’s who of international and local stars at the time like André the Giant, Bruno Sammartino, Dick Murdoch, Dusty Rhodes, Harley Race, Killer Kowalski, Pat Paterson, King Curtis Iaukea, Larry O’Dea, Mario Milano, Ron Miller, and Spiros Arion. When the networks owner decide to acquire the broadcast rights for Australian Cricket they ceased coverage of WCW, and with no TV coverage promoters were facing financial ruin and closed WCW in December of 1978. While the decades past their was always talk on the local scene of “If wrestling could just return to festival hall, then we’ve reached the promised land” & “If we could just get TV / Sponsorship then we could return to Festival Hall”. Sadly no promotion ever seemed to be able to return to running regular events Festival Hall. This NJPW show will mark the last show for a great old building, now destined to be demolished for a high-rises townhouse complex.
I had the opportunity to do the meet & great before the show and got photos with many wrestlers and their championships, including Suzuki & the IWGP Intercontinental Championship. Also meet a fan who travelled from as Cairns, Queensland (2,945km) just to be their.
Prior to the first match the ring announcer (MCW’s Lord Andy Coyne) explained the rules, that their is a 20-count, and victory can only happen via pinfall, submission, or disqualification. He then states the following contest is scheduled for one fall, to which the crowd chants “One-Fall”, a theme which continued all thought out the night along with the 2-sweet chant at a 2-count pinfall attempt.
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Match #1: Lance Archer def. Elliot Sexton.
Archer makers his usually entrance spraying water onto everyone in the front few rows of the crowd before going into the crowd standing on a chair and spraying water over everyone in that section. After entering the ring Archer cut a promo stating how the only thing he learned from the meet and great was how much Melbourne sucks, instantly getting major heat. When Archer hits a choke slam and cover for only a 2-count he get’s up and begins to intimidate the referee. The match is a very hard hitting encounter with Archer getting most of the offence before Sexton hits a big boot to take Archer off his feet. Archer hits the Blackout and gets the pinfall win after about 10 minuets. A good showing by Sexton and the crowd did get behind him during the match.
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Match #2: Yuji Nagata def. Chase Owens.
Yuji Nagata comes out to a big cheer, the match was Chase being the younger & faster man out moving Nagata for most of the match. Towards the end of the match Nagata gets the upper hand, eventually hitting a back suplex and getting the pinfall victory after about 10 minuets. While their was chants for Nagata, this match by then end of the night didn’t feel like it was in the top 4 matches.
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Match #3: Evil & Sanada def. Gino Gambino & Bad Luck Fale = NON-TITLE (Sanada pined Gino Gambino).
Gino Gambino & Bad Luck Fale are introduced as “Bullet Club”, after Fale inducted Gambino at MCW November Rain last November, and make their way to the ring first receiving a huge reaction from the crowd, Fale does not attack the ring announcer. Next Evil comes out in his full entrance gear including lasers, then Sanada enters, also receiving a huge reaction. The crowd starts chanting “Mr. Juicy”, Gambio’s former name on the Australian independents, then they chant for Evil, Fale, & Sanada. During the match out the crowd continues to chant “Mr Juicy”, Gambino then tags in Fale. Sanada try’s to lift Fale but can’t, then Evil enters the ring and try’s to lift Fale but can’t, finally Gambino enter the ring and try’s to show L.I.J. how to lift Fale, but also cant. After a corner clothesline on Sanada by Fale, Gambino hits a big splash for a 2-count that Evil breaks up. Evil tosses Fale out of the ring and calls for a BrainBuster with Sanada (a theme that continued for almost every match to fallow) but Gambino delivers a double Suplex. Evil and Sanada have now crawled to opposite corners where Gambino delivers running clotheslines to both. Gambino then pulled down his straps and teases a stinkface (which he used while on the Australian impendents) but stopes pulles his straps back up to waist height and walks to Evil who the referee is checking on, from behind Sanada hits a low blow and rolls up Gambino for a pinfall win after about 15 minuets. A really good match where Gambino looked like a star, I’m interested to see if he’ll be going to Japan after the tour.
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Match #4: Cody, Nick Jackson & Matt Jackson def. Toa Henare, Juice Robinson & Kurshida (Nick Jackson pined Toa Henare.
Toa Henare, Juice Robinson & Kurshida enter first all to Kurshida’s theme and get a good reaction, Cody & The Young Bucks enter separately and both still get massive applause and chants of “The Elite”. Henare starts of against Cody, while Henare starts strong Cody soon get’s the upper hand this the Bullet Club making quick tags and working over Henare. When Cody get’s taged back in he calls for the BrainBuster but fails and tags in Nick, who also fails and tags in Matt who tries but Henare turns into a suples and tags in Juice. Juice runs wild and delivers clotheslines to both the bucks, even getting a “Juice” chant. Soon the Bullet Club has emptied the ring and Cody goes for Omega’s Terminator pose, which mostly got booed at first with both of the bucks looking puzzled. Shotly after the bucks join the pose and most of the crowd clapped along, eventually diving on to all three men on the outside by the entrance ramp. Shortly after the action returns to the ring with Juice & Cody, with Juice having the upper hand he tags in Hanare to run wild. The crowd starts to chant for Kurshida, who hasn’t been in the match up to this point. Kurshida gets taged in to applause and chants. Towards then end of the match, Kurshida had the Hoverboard Lock on Nick but Cody makes the save, and hit’s the Cross Rhodes on Kurshida, Juice runs in and starts hitting punches to all of the Bullet Club as the fans Chant “Juice, Juice” in time with him, but he get to cocky and all three members hit him with a SuperKick. Henare re-enters the ring, but gets caught a the bucks get him with the Meltzer Driver. A good match again about 20 minuets. During the post match the crowd starts by chanting for Omega, Cody mentions that his father wrestled in Festival Hall during in the 1970’s, stating the bucks weight 206 pounds. The Young Buck say the last time they were in Melbourne was 10 years ago, The "Bullet Club is Not Fine”, it’s completed, “things in the Bullet Club are only fine when we have Kenny Omega”, but your gonna have to make it right bro. They then film a clip for Being the Elite, Cody point’s out the young kind but tells them to cover their ears, he then goes into the crowd and helps a little kid cover his ears while the crowd chants “F— The Revival”.
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Intermission
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Marcus Pitt & Damian Slater def. Robbie Eagles & Mick Moretti (Damian Slater pined Robbie Eagles).
"Notes Lost"
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Jay White def. Slex = NON-TITLE.
Slex enters first to a good reaction from the crowd, Jay White then enters and gets a louder reaction. Their are some chants for both men before the match starts. While Slex does get some time to shine in the match, ultimately Jay White was amazing, White hits the blade runner for the pinfall victory after about 15 minutes.
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Minoru Suzuki def. Jonah Rock = NON-TITLE.
Jonah Rock get a good reaction from the crowd, Suziki’s music begins and the crowd starts to clap in time, with a loud “KAZE NI NAREEEEEE”! While the referee is checking Suzuki he keeps taunting him by moving his leg like he might kick him while the crowd is loudly chanting for Suzuki. The match starts with both men trading chops. Jonah then gets the upper hand and tosses Suzuki to the mat, While Jonah gets a light TMDK chant Suzuki rolls out onto the apron. As Jonah goes to pick Suzuki put and bring him back in the ring Suzuki puts on a Armbar while hanging upside down over the ropes. He brakes the hold before 5 but drags Jonah under the bottom rope & tosses him into a steel chair. Seeing Suzuki with a chair the referee takes it from him and places over by the timekeepers area, while the referee was distracted Suzuki got a second steal chair and hit Jonah with it. When the referee returns Suzuki starts to choke Jonah with the chair and the referee starts counting for a count-out, to which Suzuki swats the referee’s hand away then rolls in the ring and lays down. When Jonah re-enters the ring Suzuki applies a submission but Jonah makes to the ropes. Eventually Suzuki goes for a running soccer kick off the ropes but Jonah catches him & slings him into the corner before delivering a clothesline before delivering a delayed vertical suplex for a 2-count. Jonah calls for the BrainBuster but Suzuki slips behind and then attempts the gotch style piledriver but cant quite join his hands. Suzuki tries a second time for the gotch but still can’t join this hands, he knees Jonah to the mid section before coming off the ropes into a massive clothesline. Jonah goes for the pin again but only a 2-count. In the closing stages Suzuki has a choke hold on but releases it to go for the gotch one more time, he hits the gotch and covers Jonah for the pinfall victory after about 10 minuets. After the match both men receives a standing ovation, with Suzuki stating “I’ll Be Back!”.
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MAIN EVENT Kenny Omega, Tama Tonga, & Tanga Loa def. Kazuchika Okada, Tomohiro Ishii, & Rocky Romero (Kenny Omega pined Rocky Romero)
Tama Tonga, & Tanga Loa enter first, then Kenny Omega who got one of the loudest reactions of the night. CHAOS all entered as one with Kazuchika Okada also getting a reaction just as loud as Kenny’s. The crowd chant’s “Holy S—”, “This Is Awsome”, “Okada” & “Kenny”. Rocky demands to start the match against Tanga Loa even before the bell has rung. After about 5 minuets the match broke down into chaos with all 6 men brawling through the floor section of the crowd. When it returned into the ring we got a Okada-Omega face off where the collected crowd lost their minds. Going into the closing moments it seemed to be a move a second with everyone going for broke, eventually Kenny Omega hits Rocky with a Cross Rhodes & a One Winged Angel for the pinfall victory after about 20 minuets. Post match Kenny address the crowd, thanked them for attending and saying “we gave you a taste of what Okada-Omega 4 will be like tonight”, calls Tama Tonga & Tonga Los “Brothers” & Cody a “Bullet Club pretender” and said he’ll deal with him.