So the article was a few days delayed because covering Wrestling Dontaku and other real life happenings cut into my free time on getting thoughts on virtual paper. But better late than never, right?!

Let’s assess who won last week, shall we? Impact Wrestling Rebellion: X Division Championship: Ace Austin (c) vs TJP vs Josh Alexander; won the week and it’s always nice to see Impact get some love. This week however, we got a lot of great matches…some of which came out of left field a little. But there’s at least one legitimate MOTY contender in this Top 5.

Check it out!

Quick Results:

1. NOAH the Glory: GHC National Championship: Takashi Sugiura vs Kazuyuki Fujita (c)
   Rating: **** ¾
2. WWE SmackDown: Universal Championship: Daniel Bryan vs Roman Reigns (c)
   Rating: **** ¼
3. NOAH the Glory: GHC Jr Tag Team Titles: Stinger (HAYATA & Yoshinari Ogawa) (c) vs NOSAWA Rongai & Ikuto Hidaka
   Rating: **** ¼
4. AJPW Champion Carnival: Kento Miyahara vs Yuma Aoyagi
   Rating: **** ¼
5. NXT UK: Aoife Valkyrie vs. Meiko Satomura
   Rating: ****

Honorable Mentions:

• NOAH the Glory: GHC Heavyweight Championship: Keiji Mutoh (c) vs Masa Kitamiya
  Rating: *** ¾
• Champion Carnival: Shuji Ishikawa vs Kento Miyahara
  Rating: *** ¾
• NXT: Kushida & MSK vs Legado del Fantasma
  Rating: *** ½
• Champion Carnival: Shotaro Ashino vs Zeus
  Rating: *** ½
• Impact Wrestling: X Division Title: Josh Alexander (c) vs Ace Austin
  Rating: *** ½
• Champion Carnival: Yuma Aoyagi vs Koji Doi
  Rating: *** ½
• Champion Carnival: Shotaro Ashino vs Suwama
  Rating: *** ¼
• NOAH the Glory: Kaito Kiyomiya, Yoshiki Inamura & Kinya Okada vs M’s Alliance (Noamichi Marufuji, Masaaki Mochizuki & Masato Tanaka)
  Rating: *** ¼
• WWE SmackDown: Intercontinental Championship: Big E vs Apollo Crews (c)
  Rating: *** ¼
• NOAH the Glory: Yasutaka Yano, Daisuke Harada & Atsushi Kotoge vs Full Throttle (YO-HEY, Seiki Yoshioka & Hajime Ohara)
  Rating: *** ¼
• AEW Dynamite: Hangman Page vs Brian Cage
  Rating: ***
• Champion Carnival: Jake Lee vs Shuji Ishikawa
  Rating: ***
• Impact Wrestling: Qualifying Match:  Brian Myers vs Matt Cardona
  Rating: ***
• NXT: Bronson Reed vs Austin Theory
  Rating: ***
• NOAH the Glory: Kongoh (Katsuhiko Nakajima & Nioh) vs Akitoshi Saito & Junta Miyawaki
  Rating: ***
• WWE Raw: RK Bro vs Shelton & Cedric
  Rating: ***
• NOAH the Glory: Kotaro Suzuki vs Yuya Susumu
  Rating: ***
• Impact Wrestling: Qualifying Match: Sami Callihan vs Eddie Edwards
  Rating: ***
• Champion Carnival: Shinjiro Otani vs Suwama
  Rating: ***
• Champion Carnival: Jake Lee vs Kohei Sato
  Rating: ***

5. NXT UK: Aoife Valkyrie vs. Meiko Satomura

From Mitchell’s Coverage:

Aoife drags Meiko back up, fires up and runs from the corner, but the enziguri misses! Meiko waistlocks for the DANGEROUS SAIDO!! Both women are down and a standing count begins! The count reaches 5 of 10 before Meiko gets to her feet. Meiko KICKS Aoife again, then aims from a corner. Aoife ROCKS Meiko before Scorpio Rising! HEEL KICK!! Aoife hurries to get Meiko in the drop zone then climb up top! MOONSAULT!! Cover, TWO!!! Meiko survives again and Aoife can’t believe it! Aoife fires herself back up and goes back up top. Meiko slowly rises, Aoife takes aim, PEREPETEIA FLOPS!!! Meiko hits a DDT!! And then HANDSPRING AX KICK!

Aoife shakes her head, she’s not done yet! Meiko CLUBS Aoife back down, then HANDSPRING AX KICKS again! Aoife again sits up and glares at Meiko! Meiko KICKS Aoife in the chest! And then, SCORPIO RISING!!! Cover, Meiko wins!!

Winner: Meiko via Scorpio Rising

2t. AJPW Champion Carnival: Kento Miyahara vs Yuma Aoyagi

From Mathew’s Review:

The two are now back into the ring as Yuma tries to apply the End Game onto Kento, giving Yuma a hard time to not lock it in fully as he grabbed the ropes. Yuma climbed to the top rope as it looked like he was going for an Elbow Drop but Kento quickly gets up to fight him on the top, leading to Kento to hit a Superplex as they both go down! Kento hits Yuma with a Blackout on the back of the head but didn’t fully get a chance to hit a German Suplex, so he hits another Blackout instead. Kento calls for the Shutdown German Suplex Hold but Yuma headbutts him with the back of his head, hitting a German Suplex but Kento got up to hit a German Suplex as well and the two are down! The two get up and start beating each other with stiff forearms until Yuma got Kento down on the mat, still hitting the forearms but Kento fights back with forearms as well! Yuma finally won that exchange and picks him up for the Rockstar Butser but Kento found life in himself, reversing it into a Brainbuster! Kento went for a Blackout but Yuma catches his leg, hitting him with a spin kick. Yuma went for the Rockstar Buster again but Kento fought off and hits the Blackout! Yuma isn’t moving as the referee starts to count but Kento forced him up, going for the Shutdown German Suplex Hold as Yuma reversed it into the End Game! Yuma has it locked in fully this time as Kento is fading, so Yuma lets go to pin him as Kento barely kicked out! Kento ducked the spin kick to hit the Blackout and as he went for another, Yuma reversed it into the European Clutch as Kento kicked out at two again! Kento hits the Blackout and tries to get the Shutdown German Suplex Hold, Yuma struggling as hard as he could but fails to do so as Kento hits the move to get the win. Yuma’s chances of win are now gone as Kento is tied with three others. One day, Yuma will beat Kento and it will be a great moment but today is not that day.

Winner: Kento via Shutdown Suplex Hold

2t. NOAH the Glory: GHC Jr Tag Team Titles: Stinger (HAYATA & Yoshinari Ogawa) (c) vs NOSAWA Rongai & Ikuto Hidaka

From My Results:

HAYATA was on the receiving end of all that, eventually making a comeback on Hidaka, and Ogawa takes the hot tag and shows more fire than we usually see out of the veteran Rat Boy. Relentless Hip Tosses, Powerslams, and power, causes Ogawa to fall over in exhaustion after taking on both challengers for a little comedy.

HAYATA comes back in and keeps the pressure up, but NOSAWA and Hidaka prove themselves to be resilient. Numerous pinfall breakups, La Magistral from NOSAWA as a callback to how he beat Ogawa in a singles match, Shining Wizard as a mock/homage to Muto from NOSAWA, but all for near falls. Just crazy action that everything felt very high risk with great break ups.

Hidaka laced HAYATA in a Grapevine Ankle Lock to give NOSAWA full access to the victory, but as he goes for La Magistral again, Ogawa turns the tables and gets a Head and Leg capture to barely retain! Great match!

Winner: Ogawa via Head and Leg Cradle

2t. WWE SmackDown: Universal Championship: Daniel Bryan vs Roman Reigns (c)

From Mitchell’s Coverage:

Heyman is panicking again as Bryan shifts around, to the YES LOCK!! Roman endures again, the hands blind him for only a moment, and Roman sees ropes! Roman claws his way over, reaches out, but Bryan gets that arm to shift Roman around! YES LOCK AGAIN!! Roman is stuck in the center of the ring!! Roman fights to get free from underneath! Roman starts to ground ‘n’ pound Bryan with big forearms and elbows! Roman high stacks to get the dead lift for a POWERBOMB! Roman glares, and throws even more forearms down on Bryan now! He lets off to get Bryan back up, for another POWERBOMB!!

Roman backs off for just a moment, but gets Bryan back up, into the facelock! Bryan fights off the Guillotine?! Bryan still has power, but Roman shifts to a GUILLOTINE with the left!! Bryan is stuck in the body scissors now! Bryan flails, reaches, but he’s fading! Roman squeezes tighter, Bryan is OUT!! Roman wins!!

Winner: Roman via Guillotine

1. NOAH the Glory: GHC National Championship: Takashi Sugiura vs Kazuyuki Fujita (c)

From My Results:

Fujita manages to knock Sugiura down long enough to pull him outside and run him into the guardrails as he comes back in to apply a Single Leg Boston Crab. Sugiura gets to the ropes, fires up and drives Fujita into the corner to start peppering in Elbows. Fujita absorbs them, meets Sugiura in the corner with a Lariat which has him slump down, so Fujita goes to town with strikes. German Suplexes from Fujita, Fujita goes for a Soccer Ball Kick, but Sugiura picks the ankle and locks in an Ankle Lock for a hot minute. Fujita is stuck for a while, but gets to the ropes, but the damage is visible. Sugiura found a way to take a little of the power base away and Fujita is too stubborn to stop his offense.

The strike exchanges became insane. Fujita lands 2 Soccer Ball Kicks, goes for a third but gets caught in an Olympic Slam. Then we get an open hand slap exchange of glory. Fujita showed a lot in the gas tank and put a lot of great effort into this match, for anyone that questions his motivations at times, this was an amazing Strong Style bout.

Sugiura managed to barely edge out Fujita after three more Olympic Slams. Fujita gets stretchered out to get over the violence and physicality.

Winner: Sugiura via Olympic Slam

Thoughts:

The Meiko match was unexpected, Roman and Daniel tend to put on quality matches, but this was above what usually gets delivered on TV and NOAH is just hard to beat the last few years. Let’s not completely overlook AJPW since as much as I’m not sold on Yuma, he’s done well to make use of the push he’s being given.

My choice is pretty obvious this week. As much as I love the Samoan Sex Machine, NOAH’s Killing Machine getting the National title back in a grueling strong style, bright red violent sex of a match. So Kazuyuki Fujita vs Takashi Sugiura, is where my vote goes for this final April pool installment.

That means the Will Ospreay vs Shingo Takagi match will be in the first week qualifying for May! That’s a little hint, since we all know that match was HAWT.