After the death of Misawa, bad publicity with Yakuza implications and the poor visual of the Burning Exodus; NOAH lost a lot of momentum about a decade ago and it seems like last year helped to right the ship.

NOAH’s first show in Budokan in basically a decade, after Budokan was the home away from home for Golden Age NOAH. A few wrestlers are still around from that point, and this will be a fun combination of new school, old school and the middle generation.

Most people care about this because of the main event, Keiji Mutoh aka Great Muta vs Go Shiozaki for the GHC Heavyweight Championship. Can Mutoh make history? Only Kensuke Sasaki and Yoshihiro Takayama have held the IWGP, GHC and Triple Crown championships. Will Mutoh become number 3?

Ratings:

• Akitoshi Saito vs Kinya Okada: Saito wins via Death Sickle @5:10 – **
• Atsushi Kotoge, Daiki Inaba & Yasutaka Yano vs Kai Fujimura, YO-HEY & Hajime Ohara: Kotoge wins via Revolutionary Moonsault @7:52 – ** ½
• Shuhei Tanijuchi & Muhammad Yone vs Masato Tanaka & Masaaki Mochizuki: Tanaka wins via Sliding D/Sliding Kick Combo @6:58 – ***
• Sugiura-Gun ( Takashi Sugiura, Kazushi Sakuraba, Kazuyuki Fujita, Kendo Kashin, NOSAWA Rongai & Kazunari Murakami) vs KONGO (Masa Kitamiya, Haoh, Nioh, Tadasuke, Manabu Soya & Katsuhiko Nakajima): Sugiura wins via Olympic Slam @10:58 – *** ¼
• GHC Junior Tag Team Championship: Kotaro Suzuki & Hidaka Ikuto vs Stinger (HAYATA & Yoshinari Ogawa) (c): Ogawa retains via Headscissors Takdown Cradle @13:05 – *** ¾
• GHC Junior Heavyweight Championship: Daisuke Harada (c) vs Seiki Yoshioka: Yoshioka wins via Crash Driver @10:58 – **** ¼ – TITLE CHANGE!!!
• Jun Akiyama & Naomichi Marufuji vs Kaito Kiyomiya & Yoshiki Inamura: Kiyomiya wins via Tiger Suplex Hold @18:12 – ****
• GHC National Championship: Kenoh (c) vs Masakatsu Funaki: Kenoh retains via Dragon Suplex Hold @10:10 – *** ½
• GHC Heavyweight Champion: Go Shiozaki (c) vs Keiji Mutoh: Mutoh wins via Hurricanrana @29:32 – **** – TITLE CHANGE!!!

Results:

Akitoshi Saito vs Kinya Okada

The usual veteran versus Young Boy match, so we all have ideas of how this will go. Saito being an original NOAH roster member is pretty special to be kicking off this return to Budokan. Kinya starts fast with strikes, slams and power moves; but the old veteran digs his heels in and starts making things difficult.

After failing on a Scoop Slam, Saito just gets merciless. Uranage, after Uranage, after Uranage, punctuated with a Claw Hold Slam, and then barking at the youngster to get back up. Kinya crawls to his feet just to eat an elbow and then fall to Death Scythe.

Atsushi Kotoge, Daiki Inaba & Yasutaka Yano vs Kai Fujimura, YO-HEY & Hajime Ohara

The fun dynamic here is really that Kotoge is the only one returning to Budokan, and there are two fairly young wrestlers involved here. We can also look into the fact that YO-HEY and Ohara are 2 thirds of the current version of Full Throttle, a group that Kotoge helped to start.

Just a lot of good fun, most of the heavy lifting was done by the youngsters Yano and Fujimura. Yano had a nice Crossbody Dive into the pile on the outside to help keep the opponents down while Kotoge dealt with Fujimura. Fujimura almost made a comeback before Kotoge put the brakes on that, rocked the youngster and then hit the old Revolutionary Moonsault for the victory.

Shuhei Tanijuchi & Muhammad Yone vs Masato Tanaka & Masaaki Mochizuki

The first match involving two veteran teams, which only leans to the M’s Alliance members since they have a more established history of success. Yone and Taniguchi trade shots and tandem attempts pretty well for about the first 5 minutes. But as soon as Mochi and Tanaka get a little momentum, things start to fall apart for the Funky Duo.

Mochi hits Ikkakugeri on Yone, which gives Tanaka the Frog Splash opportunity, but Yone kicks out. After Tanaka drops Shuhei out of the ring following the Rolling D, Mochi calls the shot and we get a Sliding Kick/Sliding D combination that Yone can’t recover from.

Sugiura-Gun ( Takashi Sugiura, Kazushi Sakuraba, Kazuyuki Fujita, Kendo Kashin, NOSAWA Rongai & Kazunari Murakami) vs KONGO (Masa Kitamiya, Haoh, Nioh, Tadasuke, Manabu Soya & Katsuhiko Nakajima)

This was gorgeous and chaotic how everyone paired off correctly and the moves had weight even during small bursts to further storylines. Soya and Fujita went at each other’s throats like two bulls and it was great to watch each have a moment of success, while Fujita still got the last word before the stereo tag outs.

We saw the Kongo Line of elbows from everyone, except Nakajima. Nakajima was off messing with Murakami. Kendo Kashin continues his inability to be useful, when he tries to get Sugiura to hold Kitamiya, but Kitamiya moves and we have some miscommunication. That continues when Nakajima does his corner pose chokes against Murakami, while Kashin tries to kick Nakajima off by doing a similar in the ropes move, but it appears to be helping Nakajima more than hurting.

Sugiura works a lot toward the end, taking on tandem strikes from Kitamiya and Nakajima, as they establish why they are the Heavyweight tag challengers, but as soon as Nioh got tagged in, you had to assume that wasn’t gonna work well. As The Agression work over Sugiura, Sakuraba shows up to choke out Nakajima, Sugiura takes out Kitamiya and then grabs Nioh in the Olympic Slam and grabs the win for Suigura-Gun.

GHC Junior Tag Team Championship: Kotaro Suzuki & Hidaka Ikuto vs Stinger (HAYATA & Yoshinari Ogawa) (c)

Kotaro and Ogawa start off with early trades of everything. They counter, they leg trip and pop up to face off, when one disrespects, the other returns in kind. You can tell this is a feud where they know each other very well and it’s just a clash of two alphas.

The fun part was how the partners complimented them. Hayata’s style is higher risk and a little flashier, but it’s not ridiculous, whereas Hidaka prefers a few cute tricks like his Rewind Waterwheel Kick he calls I’ll Be Back. Hayata made numerous saves during the match as Suzuki went through his laundry list of finishing moves. Funnel Blaster, Blue Destiny, Tiger Driver and Javelin were all hit, but Hayata found ways to get away from Hidaka to interrupt the pinfall.

Hayata runs out Hidaka, manages to distract Kotaro enough for Ogawa to regain his sense and go for a Headscissors Takedown that he turns into a cradle, and picks up the pinfall!

GHC Junior Heavyweight Championship: Daisuke Harada (c) vs Seiki Yoshioka

Lightning fast start, counters, attack ducks, rope runs, absorbing a few strikes and just coming back at others. Harada leads Yoshioka into the ropes, hits a Release German Suplex, hits the Release Belly to Belly into the corner, Henkei Knee Upper and even the Turn Over Knee, but only for a 2 count. After the legs started to slow on both, the haymakers flew. A match that went from jumping over leg sweeps and counter wrestling, turned into a war of attrition.

Yoshioka rocks Harada with a Thrust Kick and lands a Pumphandle Side Driver, but only for 2. Styles Clash set up, but instead of the Clash, he jumps and drives the opponent down onto their shoulders, CRASH DRIVER! We have a new Junior champion!

This was blistering pace of fun and excitement mixed with logical wrestling moves and felt important and not spotty. Damn good match.

Jun Akiyama & Naomichi Marufuji vs Kaito Kiyomiya & Yoshiki Inamura

Akiyama started off for a while, since he wanted to size up both of these new generation members. NOAH was built around Akiyama, as a protégé of the Four Pillars and the unofficial fifth Heavenly King he is the remaining measuring stick to test the new generation out in the Giant Baba AJPW dojo style. And did he ever put them through their paces. Akiyama’s Sternness gimmick was back in full force as he challenged Inamura’s power and Kiyomiya’s spirit.

Inamura got the first feather in his cap when he was able to win the power struggle with Akiyama, but Kiyomiya wasn’t so lucky. Akiyama dismantled his arms and put him through the paces. Akiyama hinted towards the Exploder a few times, even hitting the normal version, never his signature Wristclutch variation. Marufuji on the other hand felt like he was the guiding hand to see what Akiyama felt. Marufuji’s moves were crisp, and he punished the younger wrestlers at time, but the tension and crowd got audibly excited when Akiyama mixed it up with any of them.

Kiyomiya managed to eat a True Tiger King, Hook Kick and even get out of the Perfect Key Lock before finding his second wind. Coming off the ropes, he connects with a Headbutt to Marufuji and NOAH’s Genius stayed rocked. A German Suplex set the stage and a Tiger Suplex Hold won the match.

After the match Akiyama had some words with both younger wrestlers, almost as if giving them his/Misawa’s/NOAH’s blessing to bring the ark back into a bright future. Really great match with a poignant moment afterwards.

GHC National Championship: Kenoh (c) vs Masakatsu Funaki

Kenoh is usually egotistical and dismisses his opponents but this was the first person he seemed to show respect to. Funaki showed off his wrestling prowess and the reason why he’s a former King of Pancrase. Single leg takedowns, shooting doubles, grabbing for limps and even going into Full Mount and slapping Kenoh around just to prove he has the superior ground game.

Funaki outwrestled Kenoh in every way possible. The match was nearly over when Funaki hits the Hybrid Blaster and sinks in a Rear Naked Choke, but it was too close to the ropes so Kenoh managed to grab out for dear life. Eventually standing back up, Funaki tried to strike the weakened champion into a position that he could take advantage of, but Kenoh got a small surge and unleashes a flurry of strikes and a Roundhouse Kick that landed with a hard thud. Funaki is groggy, tries to swing, Kenoh slips around the back and snaps off a Dragon Suplex Hold for the surprising victory!

GHC Heavyweight Champion: Go Shiozaki (c) vs Keiji Mutoh

The best champion of 2020, who finally had a title reign worthy of an Ace; versus the historic relic chasing history. Mutoh wants to be the third man to hold the IWGP, Triple Crown and GHC Heavyweight championships in his career, whereas Go; he wants to continue to prove himself as the spirit of NOAH in the spiritual home of NOAH.

There were great callbacks from both men in this match. Ironic callbacks when Shiozaki charges Mutoh on the ramp to land a move is cute. Mutoh went after Go’s legs to build off his victory from earlier this month. Shining Wizard stunned Shiizaki in the ropes, and then a Dragon Screw while he was hung up was clever. Mutoh lands an Emerald Flowsion for only two. The previous victories of a Figure Four from Mutoh and Moonsault from Shiozaki weren’t enough to win this match but build well.

Awesome sequence between Mutoh and Go!https://t.co/Y9q5Nv2qJC#noah_ghc #ノア日本武道館 pic.twitter.com/xenlSdzhZH

— Ciaràn (@CiaranRH) February 12, 2021

Toward the end of the match things did get dicey, but it’s hard to call them botches. Mutoh failed on the first attempt to Emerald Flowsion, but he failed on the initial scoop, so he dropped him and sold exhausted. Shiozaki had a scary Avalanche Brainbuster, but aside from looking dangerous was completely fine. Also we can look at the moment Mutoh half his the backbreaker and looked like he was going to Moonsault, but didn’t pull the trigger. Again, hard to tell if that was him not feeling like he could pull it off, so he audibled, or if it was supposed to get the crowd excited to see a Mutoh Moonsault post knee surgery.

As Shiozaki looked to end things, connecting with a Lariat and then winding up for a Gowan Lariat, Mutoh jumped, Hurricanrana and flash pinfall! Shiozaki’s reign ends to a flash pin from a legend and Shiozaki is beside himself.

Overall Score: 8.75/10

This was a beautiful blend of new generation versus the old, and a fairly balanced mixture on who was victorious in the pivotal battles as well. Kenoh getting a surprise win when he was losing 90% of the fight was great, Kiyomiya and Inamura getting the nod from Akiyama, all the way up to Mutoh making history with a flash pin.

With Kaito Kiyomiya coming out after Mutoh’s victory, that makes complete sense. Mutoh’s victory over Kiyomiya last year is what gave him the idea to make a run at the GHC championship. Speaking of ideas, if Kiyomiya is the first challenger, and fails…it’s definitely possible to see Akiyama challenge Mutoh. Akiyama didn’t eat the pinfall in the special tag, looked great and I could see an angle for him to want to return the belt to real NOAH wrestlers and not a legend padding his resume.

Either way, this show was great action from top to bottom and historical on multiple levels. NOAH’s return to Budokan and Mutoh becoming the third man to hold the major Heavyweight titles in Japan.