All Japan Pro Wrestling New Year Wars 2021 Day 2 - 1/3/2021

 All Japan Pro Wrestling New Year Wars 2021 Day 2 - 1/3/2021

 Day 1 is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/01/all-japan-pro-wrestling-new-year-wars.html

 I skipped the second match.

 

Ryuki Honda and Alejandro vs Francesco Akira and The Bodyguard

BODYGUARD IS BACK! I think him and Zeus are the coolest. The Bodyguard sings his entrance theme for some reason. The announcers talked over it though so it couldn't be heard. I've never noticed it before if he had it, but Bodyguard has a tattoo over his ear. Alejandro mocks Bodyguard's singing during his entrance.

Ale goes under the legs to escape an Akira wristlock. Akira hits a real fast leg lariat. Akira is outside but moves when Ale goes to dive and Ale cancels the dive seeing that. Honda gets in and slaps on a crab which Akira escapes and Ale comes back in. Bodyguard gets in and lariats Ale. He hits multiple lariats on him in the corner but Honda interrupts it. Bodyguard gets double irish whipped but knocks down both dudes with a lariat. Akira topes Honda into the rails. Bodyguard then gets the surprise win here with a camel clutch on Ale. it was a fine warm-up opener.

Evolution (Dan Tamura & Hikaru Sato) & Shuji Ishikawa vs. JIN (Jake Lee & Koji Iwamoto) & TAJIRI

Lee and Shuji start us off but don't do much. Koji takes lariats from all 3 opponents in the corner and Shuji double stomps him from the 2nd rope. Sato and Koji exchange some strikes. Then Tajiri comes in and is forced to break after a Sato armbar. Tajiri and Dan have a not good strike exchange and Tajiri gets triple stomped, then Dan gets triple stomped. Dan chest clubs Jake and takes a knee to the gut. Dan hits Karelin's lift and Evolution double team clothesline Lee on the ropes.

Lee hits a big knee to Dan for 2 then wins it with a backdrop in a short match that didn't really do anything for anyone.

 Atsuki Aoyagi, Kento Miyahara & Rising HAYATO vs. Enfants Terribles (Kuma Arashi, Shotaro Ashino & Yusuke Kodama)

 

Rising reverses a hiptoss attempt into an armdrag. Kento tries to shoulderblock Kuma but hurts himself in the process. Aoyagi gets some dropkicks in on Kuma but gets nowhere. Kum accidentally knocks his teammates off the apron and Aoyagi dives on all three of them. Rising and Aoyagi try to suplex Kuma but instead, Kuma suplexes both of them.

Ashino double Karelin's lifts Aoyagi and Kodama sentons in on Aoyagi at 5 minutes. Kuma tries a pop-up move on Aoyagi he dropkicks out of it.  Kento then hits his dropkicks on Kuma.

Rising tags himself in and springboard dropkicks Ashino. He superkicks him in the face which Ashino doesn't sell, but he sells the 2nd and 3rd superkicks. Ashino hits a great front suplex on Rising then giant swings him as his partners attack Rising. The faces all do corner moves onto Ashino and Aoyagi tries to help Rising but nails hims instead. Ashino then germans Aoyagi and Rising. He then german's Rising again before tapping him out to the ankle lock. This was okay.  I was surprised they didn't follow up on the Aoyagi/Rising stuff from the day before.

All Asia Tag Team Title Match - Purple Haze (Izanagi & Zeus) (c) vs. Enfants Terribles (Hokuto Omori & Koji Doi)

Zeus!

The finish

ET = Infant Terribles, PH = Purple Haze

All of ET and PH is out there. Omori and Iza exchange elbows to start and Omori wins that battle. Iza kind of fails to block an Omori elbow and hits a bad spin kick. Both PH and ET teammates interfere on their teammates behalf. Iza gets thrown outside and ET takes some free shots on him.

Omori tries to dropkick Zeus in the corner but Zeus is too far back and he misses, taking a silly fall. Doi loads his trunks up with stuff during all of this and sprays Iza with the spray they have and then sticks a screwdriver in his head. Zeus has enough of it and steps in to help out but ET remains in control. Iza finally tags out to Zeus and Zeus makes the comeback on Doi.

2 members of ET come in, right in front of the ref and he ignores it. Zeus hits a double clothesline on his opponents and nails Kodama(He is with ET) with one. Zeus gorilla presses Kodama onto his ET friends on the outside. Angry Zeus is fun.

Zeus hits a corner lariat on Doi and then a big overhead suplex. Zeus tags out and Iza hits some kicks on Omori. Omori hits a big low blow which the blind ref misses again. Iza goes for the pin but Kuma of ET pulls out the ref and again, nothing will happen. Kodama then jumps in the ring again and Iza has to fight a 1v2. PH finally comes in to help out and Iza/Zeus do a dropkick doomsday device.

Omori is back up in no time and hits two cutters onto Iza for 2. Omori hits a nice german on him for 2. Iza does a german into a tiger suplex for the win. I wanted to like this but I didn't due to the blatant interference that nobody seemed to care about. 

GAORA TV Title Tables, Ladders & Chairs Match - Yoshitatsu (c) vs. Jun Kasai

This is likely the first TLC match in AJPW history and maybe the first ladder match period. This is also a very rare hardcore match in general.

Kasai is dressed properly here in a vest and tie and Yoshi is wearing his jacket. Yoshi goes for the belt early but Kasai chairs him. They try to do a suplex on a ladder but miss. Yoshi then hits a bad plancha to the outside. Yoshi sets up a table outside and Jun saves himself by throwing a chair at Yoshi. Kasai gets on the top rope and dives on Yoshi through the table.

Kasai grabs a piece of the table and nail Yoshi with it, but Yoshi ducks and he hits the post instead. Kasai grabs some teriyaki sticks and kicks Yoshi in the balls before putting the sticks in Yoshi's head. He then DDT'd Yoshi.

He put a ladder on Yoshi's head and hit the ladder with a chair onto Yoshi's head. Jun went for the pin and the ref reminded him that this is a TLC match and that won't do. Yoshi kept the ladder around his head and started spinning and I think legit surprised Jun with a ladder shot to the back of the head.

Yoshi did a bad blue thunder bomb onto chairs on Jun. Jun got busted open somehow through all of this and chaired Yoshi as he climbed the ladder. Jun went to climb the ladder and Yoshi powerbombed him off of it, then hit a codebreaker on him from it.

Jun rammed Yoshi with the ladder into the gut, then he hit his splash with the goggles off the ladder. Jun headbutts Yoshi off the ladder and wins. This wasn't too good. Yoshi's stuff just doesn't look good and even with weapons, most of the stuff didn't look lethal. It just came off as a TLC parody.

Triple Crown Title Match - Suwama (c) vs. Yuma Aoyagi

Yuma took Suwama's tag title away from him the day before, will he take another belt from him today?

Not too much happens early until they strike exchange and Yuma hits a good euro uppercut. Suwama hits an enzugiri and Yuma sells his DDT well. Suwama takes over with a crab and then a lariat. Suwama hits a big belly to belly on Yuma. Yuma makes a comeback and hits a crossbody from the top for 2 but Suwama stops the comeback.

Yuma does a DDT to Suwama on the apron and kind of rams his shoulder/neck into the rail. Back in and Yuma hits a dropkick and a german and Suwama gets whipped into the ropes and comes back with a lariat. Yuma hits some thrust kicks to the face but Suwama hits a lariat and both go down. they trade some forearms on their knees and get up for more. Yuma hits three german's in a row and does a grounded guillotine to him.

They go up top and Suwama superplexes Yuma. He hits him with a hard release german and a spinning lariat for 2. Yuma climbs up top and Suwama tries to powerbomb him, but Yuma turns it into a DDT. Yuma then spin kicks him for 2 and fisherman suplexes him for another 2. Then Suwama gets put back into the grounded guillotine choke. Yuma gets a close nearfall with it but can't put Suwama away.

They both get up and Suwama hits a nasty saito suplex and a big dropkick. Then he slams him with a german where Yuma ended up kicking the camera. Yuma hits a stiff spin kick to the head and then gets nailed with a lariat. Suwama hit another Saito suplex and a stiff backdrop. Yuma does a nice flip sell on a lariat and Suwama wins it with a backdrop.

This ended up being pretty good and was a nice carry job on Yuma. Suwama brought tons of stiffness and Yuma was able to give a little back and make it seem like he had a shot at winning this. Not a bad effort at all though I think they should have had Yuma get more in or maybe kick out more to put over the result of Suwama needing a little extra to beat Yuma.

Overall thoughts: I did skip the second match but the main was the only real good thing here. The rest was disappointing for various reasons. At least there was a little variety here though which is always welcome.