Better late than never, I have decided to ramble about my favourite matches from this year’s Princess Cup (the final will be covered in my review of the Korakuen at some point in the next few days). I know some people have had issues with the booking, but I thought, from an in-ring perspective, it was a very good tournament. There were some matches I didn’t get into here that were also really good (mainly because that was all I had to say about them), and I don’t think there was anything that left me feeling like I wasted my time. Anyway, on with the rambles.
Miu Watanabe vs Ren Konatsu (20/7/26)
In my last TJPW review, I mentioned that it felt like time for Ren Konatsu to have the barrier raised. It didn’t have to be anything drastic, but I wanted to see her tested by something beyond an undercard tag. I’d forgotten this match was already booked. It was the perfect moment to see how Ren could handle herself against sterner opposition.
What made it ideal is the way that Miu handles herself in these situations. She works like a pro, slapping on headlocks and controlling the pace of the action. Nothing was handed to Ren. She had to fight for it all, and that’s exactly what she needed. Since debuting, she’s had a tendency to smile her way through matches, unable to hide how much she’s enjoying herself. Miu wasn’t about to let that happen. When Ren was wrenching on Miu’s arm late on, you could see her fighting to keep the hold on, desperately trying to adjust to prevent Miu from reaching the ropes. That’s what she’s been missing.
Of course, Konatsu is still far from perfect. She needs to work on selling the wear and tear of a match, getting across the damage that’s been inflicted. I also think she’s fallen into a habit of throwing out her high spots because they’re her high spots. TJPW is typically good at making big moves mean something, but Ren’s are starting to lose their wow factor. She went for her springboard dropkick in between two submissions based around the arm, and it felt like it was there because she can do it, rather than because it was the next natural step.
However, she’s come a long way. Watching her here, as she desperately tried to cling on against a force too powerful for her, you could start to see the wrestler she’ll become take shape. I have faith she’ll get there eventually. Especially if she has people like Miu around to guide the way.
Miyu Yamashita vs Uta Takami (20/7/26)
It’s no secret that I love Uta. Takami has seemingly gone out of her way to appeal to me, picking up strands of influence from Shoko, Mizuki and Mei Suruga. It’s made her a delight to watch.
However, this match also continued the theme of Miyu Yamashita’s rejuvenation. One of the many things I loved about Miyu’s time on top of TJPW was her ability to adapt to working with wrestlers further down the card. She’s always had a knack for playing to other’s strengths, whether it’s being caught off guard by Pom’s shin kicks or Raku’s lullabies. Here, it was Uta’s speed. When Miyu got a hold of her, this match felt elementary. She’s bigger, stronger, and she will kick the shit out of you. However, when Yamashita made the mistake of opening up some distance between them, Uta scampered her way into an advantage. It was never enough to control the match, but it created the possibility of an upset, especially when you’re aware of Miyu’s history in the Princess Cup.
Which is ideal tournament wrestling. Most matches in the opening round feel like a foregone conclusion, and this was no exception, but I want to be tricked into believing it could be. I love that feeling of a desperate roll of the dice, where, just for a millisecond, you believe a scrambled roll-up could do the job. It didn’t, but that’s irrelevant. What matters is that they hooked me enough that I thought it could, and that has to go down as a successful outing for both Miyu and Uta.
Arisu Endo vs Chika Nanase (25/7/26)
Chika Nanase has levelled up recently. For a while, she was kinda just there. A solid enough rookie wrestler, but not anyone I had strong feelings about. Now, watching her cling to a headlock even as Arisu attempted to roll free, I’m starting to have them. My opinions about wrestling are very emotion-led, and that’s one of those things that makes me believe someone is committed to what they’re doing. Don’t just let your opponent free on their first attempt at an escape. Make them work for it!
And when looking for what’s changed for the better, I think a lot of it comes down to how she expresses herself. It’s in her roars of frustration and grimaces of pain. She feels less and less like someone remembering what she’s supposed to do next and more like a human caught up in the midst of a fight. When she knocked Endo to the floor in this match, her appeal to the crowd for support wasn’t some remembered catchphrase. It was an organic release of emotion.
I’m not suddenly suggesting she’s perfect, either. Those forearms she throws still don’t have the impact I want, and I think that plays into her running out of ideas deeper into matches. However, much like Konatsu, I’m starting to understand who she is as a wrestler. In fact, I think the person who beat her here is the ideal blueprint for her to work off, with Endo having figured out a way to combine her speed with a surprising burst on power. Nanase will have to put her own twist on it, but the foundations are being laid, and it’s lovely to see.
Miyu Yamashita vs Rika Tatsumi (25/7/26)
Rika vs Miyu is a match with a lot of history. One full of clump of hairs and bitter disappointment. Until now (excluding an Iron Man Title change), Yamashita has been the mountain Tatsumi couldn’t conquer.
It’s something Rika knows that better than anyone. She approached this match with the mindset that the longer it went, and the more of that heavy Yamashita offence she had to face, the more fucked she was. When the bell rang, there was no weakening up that leg with Dragon Screws or dropkicks against the post. It was straight to the Figure Four. Normally, you’re into the last act of a match before you start to see the desperation come to the fore, but not with Rika. From the second it started, she was going for the win.
The problem is that Miyu is still Miyu. When Rika made a mistake, going high-risk and trying to fly from the top Diamond Ass first to the floor, Yamashita was there. She may have somewhat stepped aside from her position as Ace, but she can still punish you, and when those kicks went flying in, Rika was on the back foot. Historically, Miyu has simply had too much firepower for Rika to deal with, and if Tatsumi was going to win this, that was what she had to contend with.
And that was ultimately the difference. Before, when they got into the thick of it, Rika ran out of answers. Miyu was too strong, too Miyu. Here, when push came to shove, Tatsumi found that little bit extra. When Miyu took off for Crash Rabbit Heat, she had enough to dash out of the way, to leap onto her back with a sleeper and cling defiantly to the end. There was a plan here, one that she executed well, but ultimately this match was won by that desperation. Rika had been here before, and it had always ended the same way, but that wasn’t going to happen again. She wouldn’t let it.
Honestly, I can’t pretend I’m not a little bit sad to see Rika finally get the win in these circumstances. That moment always felt like it should be for the title. Their history deserved that. However, TJPW has pulled the trigger on moving to the next generation, and there is a chance we’ll never see these two fight for the belt again. I hope that’s not the case. As this match should have reminded everyone, they are brilliant together. However, if it is, at least Tatsumi got this moment. She slayed the biggest monster from her past, and she didn’t even have to cut off her hair to do it.
Yuki Aino vs Miu Watanabe (30/7/26)
God, I love this pairing. In a company that doesn’t go full meathead wrestling very often, Aino vs Miu always feels like a breath of fresh air. They are going to bash into each other until one crumbles.
In saying that, they did walk a slightly different path from their previous title match – although it was, at the very least, adjacent. Miu was the instigator of change, trying to work over Aino’s back to remove some of that power. Thankfully, they were smart enough never to fully commit to that path. Miu nodded towards it, setting it up as a plan, but ultimately she couldn’t resist being dragged into the game of one-upmanship. I don’t want either of these two to have to sell a limb. There are better ways for them to spend their time – the bashing-into-each-other stuff.
And with every match like this, I’m more convinced that Aino should get a run with the title. She’s been a good tag-team wrestler for years, but she’s quietly proven herself on this stage, too. I hate to present it as a reward for her career, because that suggests she’s at the end of it (she’s 31; she’s got ages if she wants it), but well, yes, she does deserve to be rewarded for what she’s done. From coming in as a ring announcer to being Nonoka’s little sister to now, Aino has found a way to make everything work while steadily improving. In many ways, it’s only in the last couple of years that we’ve started to see her full potential, and these Miu matches prove that she can hang at the top of the card.
Anyway, this rocked. They cracked and bashed off each other, delighting me with every hit, and tickling that part of the brain that just wants to see two hosses go to work. Plus, Aino got the big feel good win at the end! Could you argue it was more of the same? Yes, but sometimes predictable is alright. There’s a reason only weirdos with too much money decide to put gold on a burger.
HIMAWARI vs Arisu Endo (8/8/26)
HIMAWARI is at an interesting point in her career. I don’t want to suggest she’s stalled, as she’s still someone I find consistently entertaining, but I do think she’s in the process of figuring out where she goes next. While you don’t have to be entirely serious to get to the top in TJPW, you do have to know how to work those aspects of yourself into a main event situation. For HIMAWARI, that’s combining the cheeky chappy who whips her hair around with the wee powerhouse.
And this match is the blueprint she should be following. There were still plenty of hair antics, but they never fell into the unfortunate category of existing purely because that’s what HIMAWARI does. In fact, often, they gave Endo a way into the match. Whether it was having her braids lopped around the ropes or having them used to drag her down to the floor to put her in position for a knee across the back of the head, the Powerful Cheeky Chappy’s antics backfired more often than not. Like a Kyoraku Kyomei tag title match, she worked her way through the shtick before knuckling down for the final act. At that point, this turned into something of a fight.
It was a good fight, too. They’re well matched. They’re pacey, but powerful, and while you usually want a bit of friction between styles, it worked for them. Both wrestlers had the ability to rock the other, and as they descended into the weeds of this match, that brought up the element of uncertainty that HIMAWARI ultimately pounced on. Endo was never quite able to take complete control of the action, and the response of the crowd in the final seconds said a lot. Arisu is popular, but in that moment, they were firmly behind HIMAWARI, roaring her on as she grabbed her upset.
TJPW has a lot of these at the moment, but this feels like a match we will one day see on a bigger stage. Their last singles encounter was over three years ago, and they’ve both come a long way since then. However, there were seeds scattered here that are only going to get more interesting with time. It was a great first act, and like all great first acts, it’s left me very excited to see what happens next.
Hyper Misao vs Rika Tatsumi (8/8/26)
Rika Tatsumi and Hyper Misao is an important pairing for me. Tatsumi dragging Misao back from the darkness of NEO Biishiki-gun was the first TJPW match I fell in love with, and one of those moments (alongside visiting Chocolate Square for the first time) that served as a splinter point for my taste in wrestling. It opened up my mind to different ideas of what could make a great match.
They’ve both come a long way since then, but Misao’s road has been a little bit longer. She’s still that genius, capable of putting together weird and wonderful matches, but she’s now much more suited to a situation like this. A tournament quarter-final where she’s putting the nonsense aside in the hope of winning the big one. She started things off by going after Tatsumi’s arm, showing the kind of big match planning that is more typical of Rika’s game. Perhaps no one has studied Tatsumi as closely as Misao has (love will do that to a person), and she was ready to use that knowledge.
With Rika’s tendency to go after the leg, there was a moment where I thought we were getting another TJPW limb match, but they were smart enough to keep it to a minimum. It was enough to get across the idea of damage, but not enough to make it so that either was required to go too far with the selling. While it’s obviously possible to work that way in a fast-paced tournament quarter-final, I don’t think it would have played to their strengths. Instead, it became something of a frantic back-and-forth, both finding counters to the other’s big offence. Misao even found the perfect time to deploy the cold spray, escaping a Dragon Sleeper with a burst of it in Rika’s face. It almost felt like a race to see who could get off the game-changing piece of offence first.
And truthfully, this wasn’t the match I fell in love with all those years ago. It wasn’t half as unique or interesting, but few things are. Instead, it was a fantastic personal battle between two people who know each other incredibly well. On a bigger stage, with more bells and whistles, I have no doubt these two could still cause someone to understand TJPW for the first time. On this stage, they were just brilliant at what they do.
Shoko Nakajima vs Suzume (8/8/26)
I didn’t love Shoko getting the big win over Arai only to lose to Suzume in the next round (especially as things were then evened up with the champ in a tag at Korakuen), but I’m going to ignore that for the moment. (The same applies to Aino beating Miu only to lose to Toga.) Talking about booking, good or bad, always leaves me feeling tired.
Shoko vs Suzume has always hinted at a greatness they haven’t quite reached. That’s not to say they haven’t been good (I’d argue they’ve never been bad), but it’s just never quite been the match I’ve hoped for from them. However, Suzume has never been on a run like this before, and it was no surprise to see that this match was a step up. She’s become a much more rounded wrestler in the last year or so, and as Shoko went to work wearing her down, she was able to sell the damage better than ever.
And early on, this was about Suzume struggling to keep up. She was never a full step behind Shoko, but there were at least a few inches there. However, the other side of these last twelve months is that the bee has improved at picking her moments. She excels at finding the openings needed to twist a match around. Suzume was always a counter wrestler, but she used to rely on the Ring-A-Bell. Now she’s got a wealth of ideas to throw out there when she’s in trouble. While Shoko may have controlled the bulk of the action, and there were multiple moments where it looked like she was going to steer it home, Suzume always found a reply. She didn’t get the most hits; she got the important ones.
And I still think these two have even better in them. They’re getting closer to it, though. The next step feels like a big Korakuen title match,. That room, with those stakes, and these two wrestlers? It could be special. For a tournament quarter-final, though? This was fantastic.
Rika Tatsumi vs Toga (16/8/26)
I haven’t written about her, but I think this might go down as an important tournament for Toga. Whatever I felt about the result, the Aino match showed her matching one of TJPW’s other powerhouses and gave us a glimpse into a world where she could be on Yuki and Miu’s level. Toga has always shown her best when she’s challenged. She has a tendency to be a bit bland in throwaway tags, but when you give her something to get her teeth into, there is a spark there.
And Rika, unsurprisingly, gave her plenty. While Tatsumi is a great bully, she’s also got a talent for giving people the spotlight. The highlight of this match, and the one that I want to see Toga build on, was her powering through a series of Rika’s hip attacks. There’s been a lot of chat about no-selling recently, and it’s not one I’m particularly bothered about getting involved in, but I’ve always felt it’s a mislabelled term. Great no-selling isn’t no-selling. The pain doesn’t vanish. Instead, the wrestler grits their teeth, powers up, or even just downright refuses to give their opponent the pleasure of seeing them flinch. Toga captured a touch of that here, and while she eventually crumbled under the onslaught, that’s the wrestler I want her to be.
Fingers crossed this is a sign that she’s putting it all together. At this point, the main thing for her is figuring out that consistency. I believe TJPW works because of those undercard tags, and if you coast through them, you’re never going to click with me like someone who always brings something to the table. This tournament showed that there is a place for Toga at the top of the card. I hope there’s also one for her in the middle and the bottom.
Watch Tokyo Joshi: https://www.wrestle-universe.com/en/videos?labels=-tjpw.
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