Talk about it here.

I really enjoyed this. Is this potentially Ishikawa's first ever great match? I like him as the young guy with the spunk. Really hot start with all the slaps is great fun, as is the moment where the ref checks Ishikawa's teeth and nose to make sure everything is intact. Nice stuff.

Ishikawa was the guy in yellow right? I'm so used to 2009-2011 Ishikawa and I've never seen his earlier matches. This was awesome and stiff. The slaps and especially the headbutts to the grounded opponent were brutal.

This was really great and exciting stuff. The slaps were so great.

What we wrote on segundacaida:

Yuki Ishikawa v. Kazuo Takahashi

 

PAS: This was Ishikawa's first awesome match in an awesome career. Takahashi really brutalizes him in the way you should brutalize rookies, including some nasty shoot headbutts, and hard slaps. Ishikawa fights back and lands some big shots of his own, and it actually gets pretty competitive for a minute, until Takahashi nearly rips his leg off with a one leg boston crab.

 

TKG: Yeah, Ishikawa vs. Suzuki started more competitive. This was awesome as Takahashi absoutely disrespectfully abuses Ishikawa. Shoot headbutts, face slaps, grinding his elbow into Ishikawa's nose, grinding his fist into Ishikawa's mouth, slow on rope breaks, nasty nasty punches to charlie horse the thigh, refusal to lock up when standing etc. Ishikawa just takes it and eventually comes back with a nasty shot to Takahashi's kidney and all of a sudden its on. Ishikawa tries to return the headbutts in kind. Takahashi starts to kind of punch himself out and really the kidney shot slows him a bunch. All of a sudden Takahashi is forced to accept Ishikawa and agrees to lock fingers when they get back to their feet. But the moral victory doesn't mean an actual victory. Still fucking neat neat story told through really brutal shots.

http://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2006/12/p...mi-show-14.html

Really stiff strikes by Takahashi on the ground. Brutally grinding his fist and forearm on Ishikawa is great feels a lot more violent and different from other stuff on the set. Ishikawa's eye is noticeably bruised and after delivering that beating Takahashi secures a half crab for the win. I haven't seen any of Ishikawa's modern stuff but am definitely intrigued.

 

***1/2

The slap fight at the beginning and the super-stiff headbutts were great, but I didn't think anything of the mat portions at all. I'm open-minded to matches involving guys I've never heard of but other than "Takahashi throws killer headbutts" I didn't pick up anything of note about either wrestler.

I think I had Ishikawa and Takahashi maxed up throughout the match. Be that as it may, I'm in Pate's camp. This wasn't really much of a match unless the viewer was into headbutts. These two forgot to try to score points, and most of the matwork, such as it was, led to nothing. Takahashi's half-crab was an effective finisher, though.

 

Unless someone is really into shootstyle, this isn't a match I'd recommend.

I really liked this.  The dynamic was really spot-on.  Takahashi as the disrespectful vet forcing Ishikawa to earn even the tiniest thing he got was awesome.  Takahashi appears to have a significant weight advantage and uses it and his wrestling skills to stifle any kind of takedown attempts by Ishikawa and pretty much get his at will.  Ishikawa is quicker on the mat and able to get himself into advantageous positions, but he isn't better enough on the mat to be able to hold the more powerful and experienced Takahashi long enough to get anything.  Great stuff.

The slaps were pretty brutal, the headbutts were great, but there was a story underneath all of that making it a lot better than just some brutal stiff shots.  I could have done with more openness in the presentation (television-wise) on how many points each man started with, etc. for PWFG as a whole.