Cero Reviews AJPW Champion Carnival 2021 4.29

[cero2k]

AJPW Champion Carnival 2021, Day 9
April 29th, 2021
Yokohama, Japan

Shinjiro Otani Announcement - Otani suffered a shoulder injury yesterday, I originally thought it was a kayfabe injury for the sake of the Suwama match, but it seems it may had been legit, and thus is out of the rest of the tournament. He forfeits today's match with Sato, and the next one with Zeus. Both men gain 2 points from it. I wonder if this screwed up the numbers so close to the end.

Yoshitatsu vs. Ryuki Honda - 4.5/10
Ok match, Yoshitatsu pretending to be a ruthless veteran over a young guy was a bit laughable, but beyond that the action was pretty good.

Dan Tamura, Francesco Akira & Koji Iwamoto vs. NEXTREAM (Atsuki Aoyagi & Rising HAYATO) & Izanagi - 5.5/10
Good match, everyone looked good, especially HAYATO and Aoyagi working together. This was another match to get Iwamoto over as he is going to be challenging CIMA for the Jr. Heavyweight title soon. Iwamoto once again pinned HAYATO for the win.

Black Menso-re & Takao Omori vs. TOTAL ECLIPSE (Hokuto Omori & TAJIRI) - 4.5/10
As if this couldn't get worse, instead of Omori getting the win with a belt shot, it was a DQ win when Menso-re took the title away from Omori and thought that he was trying to cheat. Omori has won every match this tour, HE should be getting a shot at CIMA. Match was ok, nothing special.

Champion Carnival 2021 Match
Zeus [8] vs. Koji Doi [2] - 7/10
This was fun, Zeus worked perfectly for Doi's strengths, and thus we had a good hoss fight between the two, a lot of striking and such. Unfortunately, they went to a double count out when they both brawled outside the ring, quite similar to Doi vs Zeus, except this time the count out actually happened while both guys were struggling with each other to make it to the ring and stop the other from doing so, so not just idiotic brawling while not paying attention to the referee.

This ending could had been a last minute change in order to keep Zeus at 10 points, because otherwise, he'd reach 12 with Otani's forfeit.

Champion Carnival 2021 Match
Suwama [8] vs. Shotaro Ashino [6] - 8.5/10
This was probably Ashino's best match of the tournament, it was back and forward, he didn't seem weak at any point, it was the same Ashino from months back. It was like a shorter version of their match from the New Year Wars show on January 24th. Ashino worked over Suwama's knee, while Suwama worked the head. At the end, Suwama won with a Backdrop.

Post-match - Both men, once again shook hands. A lot of speculation of these two becoming a team now that Violent Giants have stopped working together.

Champion Carnival 2021 Match
Shuji Ishikawa [6]vs. Jake Lee [10] - 8/10
Good match, Lee managed to hurt Ishikawa early on, and thus was dominant for most of the match. As it went on, Ishikawa started some comebacks here and there, at one point making a lot of damage on Lee after a German on the apron. Back in the ring, it became a battle of the running knees, with Lee coming close to winning after he hit the whole combo, but at the last minute, Ishikawa caught Lee with a Thesz Press and used his weight to pin Lee for the upset win.

Champion Carnival 2021 Match
Kento Miyahara [8] vs. Yuma Aoyagi [8] - 9/10
Great main event with the tag team champions colliding. Because of that, the match was a lot of back and forward action, we saw many spots where one wrestler would start a sequence, only to get cut off by the other, being that they know each other well. Both men worked over each other's heads, Aoyagi towards the End Game submission, and Miyahara towards the Shutdown German.

There was an awesome striking exchange at the end, with Aoyagi being on top of Miyahara, yet Miyahara still tried to elbow Aoyagi. We got a great sequence when Miyahara knocked down Aoyagi, but before the referee could finish the 10 count, Miyahara decided to pick Aoyagi up for the Shutdown, only for Aoyagi to turn it into the End Game for a big near fall. Big Japanese Clutch near fall by Aoyagi, but Miyahara kicked out, caught Aoyagi in the straightjacket, hit the Shutdown German bridge, and won. Another contender for Match of the Tournament.

This loss eliminates Aoyagi, his final match is with Sato, but he has losses to Suwama and Miyahara who already made it to 10.

Post-match - Miyahara cut his winner's promo, thanking all and addressing his final match with Jake Lee. This was an awesome visual because as Miyahara is cutting his promo, we see the sweat smoking out of his body.

OVERALL THOUGHTS
Good show, nothing had impressed me much until the main event, but it was so great, that I'm walking away feeling good. The show went by fast, it helped that we didn't get Otani vs Sato, but I can't imagine that match would had gone long anyway.

At this point, we can already do some math and realize that anyone without 10 points is eliminated. Matches in the final night are Lee vs Miyahara, Sato vs Aoyagi, Suwama vs Ishikawa, and Ashino vs Doi. Zeus was to face Otani. Given these matches, it really comes down to Suwama vs Ishikawa and Miyahara vs Lee, Aoyagi will likely play foil to Sato, and Ashino vs Doi is between two eliminated wrestlers.

Final Standings
Jake Lee - 10
Kohei Sato - 10
Shuji Ishikawa - 8
Suwama - 10
Kento Miyahara - 10
Yuma Aoyagi - 8
Zeus - 8 + Otani's forfeit.
Shotaro Ashino - 6
Shinjiro Otani - 4
Koji Doi - 2