I’ve not seen a lot of Kawada in this period, I tend to watch his 90s and early 00s stuff. So HUSTLE and Zero-1 Kawada is unexplored territory. A friend recommended I watch this one and I was not disappointed. This was the main event of Zero-1’s NEVER GONNA STOP! at Korakuen Hall for the World Heavyweight Championship.

Both men are past their peaks in the ring -Kawada right at the tale end of his career, whereas Tanaka is still going strong as I saw this past WrestleMania weekend in Philly). But both manage to distill the hits down into a 10-min match that hits hard and has the crowd erupting at the right moments. I love a 40-min Puroresu drama, but a 10-min wrecking ball match also has its merits.

Things kick off fast with stiff chops before the narrative builds of Tanakas lariats versus Kawada’s kicks.

It’s a quickfire greatest hits match as both hit most of their key moves on each other. What rings through most is the impact – two men that don’t need to at this stage, but absolutely want to. It’s very much a case of who can withstand the most punishment, the Korakuen crowd becoming increasingly enraptured as things build to the finishing stretch.

As the younger man, Tanaka does take a lot more of the punishment over the course. He still lays in a fair amount though, including some great looking diving forearms.

This just brings out Kawada’s obstinate best as he returns fire with a monstrously good jumping brainbuster.

Tanaka withstands a hell of a lot of punishment including a huge lariat and a kawada Bomb – so it has to take something special to put him away right? It arrives with this:

Looking closely at Kawada looking up to the Korakuen crowd after landing the kick, I’m sure he felt the reaction in the room. Quite simply, this match slaps. Sadly, I couldn’t find it uploaded to any of my usual Puro channels, but if you have the Ditch 00s archive you can find it on there. Enjoy!