Super Jr. Tag League A Block update: night 7

Ichiban Sweet Boys advance to finals

November 1 saw the last matches for A Block in Super Jr. Tag League, with three teams left alive across two critical closing bouts.

Watch the replay!

With both teams needing to win the semi main event, SHO tried to get in the minds of Ichiban Sweet Boys before the bell on behalf of HOUSE OF TORTURE, running down the venue in Ichikawa, Robbie Eagles’ home of Australia, and Kosei Fujita’s own home of Ehime. That brought the TMDK side out with a lot of anger, and though early offense was scored, it wasn’t long until SHO and Yoshinobu Kanemaru forced an error and went right to the hurt left shoulder on Fujita. A steel chair to the injured area set the Japanese Young Punk up for relentless punishment, but a leg lariat and a shot to SHO into an exposed steel buckle brought Eagles in at last.

Furious feet scored for Eagles on SHO, the Murder Machine howling in pain as Eagles went for a Ron Miller Special. To his credit, SHO withstood incredible pain, but only tapped when Yujiro Takahashi appeared to distract the referee. Capitalizing, Kanemaru hit the ring to go for Eagles own knee, with a kneebreaker onto the exposed corner seeing the Sniper of the Skies in position for a punishing Figure Four. Though Eagles scored an Asai DDT on the break, coming down on his knee in the process put both Sweet Boys in a difficult spot.

Nonetheless, Fujita came back in with blistering leg work and a moonsault press from the apron to SHO. His run of offense was brief though, the exposed steel buckle again doing its work as Kanemaru landed a big moonsault for two, transitioning into a double wrist lock. Gutting through the pain, Fujita found the ropes, and the offensive again; obviously it would be a matter of seconds before the referee was downed and H.O.T were once again on top. This time though, Ryohei Oiwa was able to hit the ring, balancing the sides for TMDK; Fujita got a near two from a German suplex and went for Abandon Hope, but once again the exposed buckle was the third (or fourth) man for the HOUSE.

Fujita stopped a whiskey mist, but ate the buckle yet again before a British Fall for two. Kanemaru went up for Deep Impact, but Fujita escaped, as Eagles came in; a modified Abandon Hope form of the Tankbuster, dubbed the Sweetbuster would give the TMDK side the win.

That left things down to the main event. War Dogs’ Drilla Moloney and Clark Connors would advance with a win, while a draw or a loss to the eliminated Hiromu Takahashi and BUSHI would see the Ichiban Sweet Boys through instead. Connors and Moloney sought an early advantage, and got just that with shots into the arena seating. Hiromu laboured in the War Dogs corner and took heavy damage before BUSHI was able to tag in with an impactful rocket tope of his own.

When Takahashi had recovered, he too would explode to the former tag champions, scoring in combination but getting dropped with a vicious snap powerslam. As the match grew chaotic, BUSHI shoved Hiromu aside to take a Hit and Run, but the War Dogs kept their focus on Takahashi, landing the Drive By and a second Hit and Run, but still not ending the match. The angered War Dogs set the Time Bomb up for a Full Clip, but BUSHI made the save; Takahashi still stayed alive through a series of Gores from Connors, but countered No Chaser into the Unnamed Roll for the win.

Playing for pride were the Skateboard Bros, Ryusuke Taguchi and Dragon Dia as they faced Tiger Mask and Capitan Suicida. Wanting to get on the board in their last match, the two masked men brought the fight, and Suicida was especially ambitious with stunning high flying attacks. The Capitan would land a brutal package DDT on Dia and then a punishing llave stretch put Tigre Suicida on the board in their last match.