Go Shiozaki vs. Naomichi Marufuji

[8.0] "This started off slow and tense, which I absolutely loved because you could just tell both men were going to erupt with big, vicious strikes at any second. The match actually wouldn't move in that direction too quickly though, as instead Marufuji gained control and began targeting Shiozaki's arm at every moment he could with his kicks and various holds, and Shiozaki's selling was very realistic and sympathetic. It was awesome once Shiozaki gained control, as he unleashed his trademark brutal chops and some thundering power moves. Marufuji would let out his own great chops, and at one point we got a great scene of both men gripping each other by one hand and delivering chops with the other, and Shiozaki totally outclassed Marufuji in terms of impact here, with Marufuji doing a great job selling just how powerful Shiozaki's chops were. There were a few big spots were both guys were slightly off in chemistry, resulting in a few underwhelming moves, but I still appreciated the creativity of these moments in theory, plus the general physicality was still very impressive. I also really appreciated how Shiozaki was still selling his worked-over arm whenever he had to use it to hit strikes or power moves, as this just made his performance even more sympathetic and compelling. Marufuji would try to finish Shiozaki off by targeting the arm with the Perfect Keylock, and Shiozaki once again sold fantastically. Both men then moves to directly trading big strikes, as Shiozaki had his massive lariats and one especially cool Misawa-esque rolling elbow while Marufuji had his sweet hook kicks and Ko-oh knees, all of which looked fantastic. Shiozaki followed up with the great combo of an Emerald Flowsion and a Gowan Lariat for the win to beat Marufuji for the first time ever. This was perhaps slightly underwhelming because I knew both men could have destroyed each other further, but I still thought this was great, especially with Shiozaki finally getting his win. ***3/4"

[8.0] "This was really good and seemed far shorter a match than actually was. The perfect Misawa's celebration, with a lot of good citations and hard hitting exchanges. I think that they could deliver still even better, but this percectly fit for the occasione. ****"

[8.0] "Very good overall. Really like how Maru worked over Shiozaki's left shoulder and the later's selling was really good. They did have some really nice sequences and good looking offenses as well. Though the finish was flat to me, the match itself was enjoyable tbh."

[9.0] "Oh my God, that was amazing! The homenages for Misawa here made me smile like an child, this was just perfect. And the story here is sensational, Shiozaki never defeated Marufuji and he finally did it! Simply amazing. ****1/2"

[8.0] "Marufuji is someone who has been rightly accused of being very RVD with his strikes in that he either smashes the opponent with them or misses very badly. Here he hit pretty much every one, brutalizing Go with his kicks and knees as well as his always great chops. Go gave as good as he got with he chops sending each others chests purple with how stiff they were. Marufuji controlled much of the match going after the forever injured shoulder of Shiozaki, ramming it into guardrails, armbreakers etc all to set up a really good submission sequence with the perfect keylock. Go? s selling was pretty great throughout but it was a little hard to shake the feeling that it was a little exhabitionary in places. There were a couple of Misawa tribute spots like the emerald flowsion but not as many as you might expect for a Misawa 10th anniversary match. They went out there and told a good wrestling story for a hot crowd and Go finally got a win over Marufuji at the9th time of asking, it still astounds me that they never had a big singles main event, this or the global league match from a couple of years ago is the biggest they have had and that was overshadowed by Nakajima Kenoh. For the position they were in they could not have done too much more fun stuff ***3/4"

[8.0] "Go is coming into the thing w/ a heavily taped up shoulder, so naturally Maru goes to town on it w/ some pretty vicious work, and he is acting cocky as hell all the way through, which made his onslaught even more compelling. Stuff like those little arrogant kicks to Go's head + pouring some drink at him was AWESOME. Maru is great at being a smug veteran systematically breaking down his opponent with a focused strategy. Go's selling was VERY surprising too - I certainly wasn't expecting to see one of the finest limb-selling performances of the year come from NOAH, but goddamn his selling was outstanding all the way through. The moment of him getting up on the corner w/ the help of the ropes, only for him to stop assisting himself with the other rope because it's killing his shoulder that Maru had been destroying, was so good. Might just be one of my favorite single match moments of the year. They kept the expected-in-NOAH soulless bomb throwing to the minimum, which I very much appreciated & was somewhat surprised at, but there still was a bit too many equally or maybe even more soulless strike no-sell exchanges that didn't interest me in the slightest. I guess that's what I'd say prevents this match from being GREAT rather than "just" a very, very good one. It's still indeed one hell of a match though - I don't watch much NOAH, but from the little amount of stuff that I've watched, this is my favorite match I've seen from them since Marufuji vs. Kiyomiya from January 2017."

[8.0] "It's one thing to say both these guys are past their prime, but it's another to say they can still pull out great matches at this point. This was a great match with both guys unloading lots of strikes against each other. Go using Emerald Flowsion in order to get his first win over Marufuji was a nice touch, ****1/4."

[9.0] "Great match, started slow with an arm lock from Marufuji, then, they started the chop battle that was nasty, they started to chop very hard and the striking part came and it was beautiful. Marufuji is still unbeliably great when he starts to unleash his striking and kick his opponent. Loved that match. (****1/4)"