Posted November 21, 20177 yr comment_5821468 Kikuchi kicks Takayama as he comes in the ring and Taka just stares him down. NOAH is making Taka look awesome and I am here for it. After Taka takes it to Kikuchi for around five minutes, he has no choice but to resort to some dirty tactics. A rake of the eyes and then he cranks out the arm of Takayama. A great submission with Kikuchi hanging on the outside of the ring just wrenching on the arm. Takayama is feeling the pain and starts cranking it up a notch with some knees that looked brutal to regain an advantage. A couple of more knees and the referee has to call for the bell. Takayama is pissed off now though so he gives another for good measure. Kikuchi should just stay down but he refuses and Takayama drills him again and then stands triumphantly on top of Kikuchi. The push of Takayama keeps going and it is glorious. ***1/2 (7.1)
March 16, 20187 yr comment_5835984 This was a fun squash and Kikuchi's at his best when he's playing the fired up underdog. Takayama no selling the leg lariats and then destroying Kikuchi was great, as well as Kikuchi's optimistic armwork, including the hanging armbar. Not quite as brutal as I was anticipating but still a dominant performance from Takayama.
March 28, 20187 yr comment_5837877 This is such a fun David vs. Goliath type match. Kikuchi excels as a fiery underdog as superkix mentioned and here it's not different. He knows he has to hit and run and that's what he does from the get go -- like a cat and mouse type scenario with Kikuchi trying to outsmart and out run Takayama, but he always gets caught and he gets brutalized when he does get caught. There's some really awesome stuff such as Takayama bending Kikuchi like a pretzel in an abdominal stretch type move where Kikuchi's head touches his knee, there's also Kikuchi countering a camel clutch by biting on Takayama's fingers and Kikuchi of course using the ropes and the refs. counts while executing armbars on Takayama. Takayama does a fantastic job of putting over Kikuchi's armwork -- namely the armbar through the ropes -- as he sells the hurt arm all the way through the end of the match.
June 15, 20187 yr comment_5853285 Takayama shaking off the surprise dropkick at the start was great. Kikuchi cleverly uses his smarts to attack a limb and get some momentary light to go on offense but obviously that wasn't going to hold up. Takayama's knees here were vicious and looked totally killer. The ref stoppage added some real gravity to help get Takayama over as a beast here, too. ***
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