WRESTLE PETER PAN, DDT’s annual biggest event, began today with the first day of a 2-day version this year.
Today’s event was held at Higashin Arena in Tokyo and can be watched on demand on WRESTLE UNIVERSE in Japanese. Former DDT wrestler Saki Akai was among the special guests on commentary. (She has also remained with the promotion in a backstage/front office position since her retirement last year while also keeping very active with her beauty salon/spa business and also work as an actress in stage/theater performances)
The paid attendance was not announced.
Match 1: Hinata Kasai Debut Match: HARASHIMA beat Hinata Kasai. Kasai is the son of deathmatch icon Jun Kasai.
Match 2: Shinichiro Kawamatsu (the real-life Japanese politician) & Yuki Ishida beat Takao Soma & Rukiya. Ishida pinned Rukiya after Flame Palm.
Match 3: Danshoku Dieno beat Kazuki Hirata & ANtonio Honda in a 3-way by pinning Honda.
Match 4: Illusion, MJ Paul & Haruto Sakuraba beat Akito, Naomi Yoshimura & Daichi Sato. Illusion pinned Akito after a swanton bomb.
Match 5: MAO, KANON & O-MENZ Kumadori beat Yuki Ueno, Shinya Aoki & Kazuma Sumi. MAO pinned Sumi after Ultra Big Tone. During his entrance, Kumadori was joined by the other members of O-MENZ for a full performance. This was his return after missing his last scheduled appearance about a month ago due to injury.
Match 6: In a “Last Minute Of Professional Life” Deathmatch, where the wrestlers had a set amount of life points based on social media activity leading into the match and the first to reduce the opponent’s life to zero by 1 count pinfalls, submissions, rope escapes and ring outs wins, DDT Extreme Champion To-y beat Yuya Koroku to retain the title. V2 for To-y. Next up: Illusion. That match will happen on 9/14 at Sapporo Sun Plaza in Hokkaido.
Muscle Sakai appeared post-intermission as Super Sasadango Machine for his comedy Powerpoint presentation ahead of his match as Sakai. Which led to…
Match 7: Minoru Suzuki beat Muscle Sakai.
Match 8: Zack Sabre Jr. & Kosei Fujita (New Japan) beat Chris Brookes & Takeshi Masada. Sabre beat Masada with I’ve Mistakenly Run To Windsor. Afterwards, Brookes requested a match against fellow countryman Sabre. That match will happen on 11/3 at Ryogoku Kokugikan.
Match 9: KO-D Tag Team Champions Yuki Iino & Yukio Naya beat Daisuke Sasaki & Hideki Okatani to retain the titles. Naya pinned Sasaki. V2 for the champs. Next up: Because the champs retained the titles, HARASHIMA & Aoki. That match will happen tomorrow. (There was going to be a title match tomorrow either way, it just depended on who the champions would be)
Main Event: KO-D Openweight Champion Kazusada Higuchi beat Jun Akiyama to retain the title. V2 for Higuchi. Next up: Ueno, which was previously announced. That match will happen tomorrow.
Day 2 is tomorrow at Korakuen Hall. The event is a legit advance sellout. Live streaming on WRESTLE UNIVERSE will begin TONIGHT at 7 PM PT/10 PM ET.
Injury Report: Just before this was posted, there was a last-minute change announced to tomorrow-Daisuke Sasaki is now off. Side injury suffered today. He was to have teamed with Okatani to face Brookes & Masada and Yoshimura & Ishida in a 3-way, which would have been for the KO-D Tag Team Championship had they won. MJ Paul is the replacement.