MLJ: Recent Uploads: Yoshihiro Asai (c) v. Negro Casas [UWA Middle]

1990-06-07 @ Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan

Yoshihiro Asai (c) v. Negro Casas [UWA Middle]

Another newly posted match from the last couple of weeks. This one has been in circulation but it's new to me and I imagine it might be new to some other people so I'm going with it. This was a UWA title match in Japan. It's one fall, which is not my favorite sort of lucha title match, but I enjoyed it a lot. Asai is someone who I think I'm able to enjoy more due to diminished expectations, than people might have five years ago. I generally know what I'm getting coming into his matches, more flash than substance. I tend to like him as a role player in trios but less so in other settings. Here, though, I was happily surprised.

What I want more than anything else in lucha title matches is a sense of struggle and competitiveness. They really brought that to the table here, in the intensity, in the strategy, in how they worked holds, and in how they escalated their offense as the match went on. If I was going to distill it, this was about Asai being quicker, Casas being more skilled technically, and both wrestlers adapting to their opponent.

The crowd was very much behind Asai, chanting away at various parts of the match. I always kind of love these UWF crowds which felt different to me than other Japanese crowds from the era. Casas also had a fun promo before the match where he broke into stilted English. Just throwing that out there in case you ever wanted to hear it.

This had a lot more matwork than I was expecting. Asai came out kicking, and Casas grounded him quickly. Towards the end of the match, he'd focus in on the leg, but leading up to that, it was mainly about containing Asai and slowing him down. They'd work in and out of holds with Asai gaining an advantage out of almost every exchange with his speed, only for Casas to work his way out of whatever hold Asai tried and ground him a bit more. A few times in here, they also had pretty spirited chopfests too. That really added to the intensity.

There were a number of specific moments I liked based around the struggle. At one point, Asai finally hit a spinning kick and he went for a Tapatia, really grinding in and throwing shots to the side and trying to make it work. When he gave up and went for a camel clutch, Casas used the shift to desperately toss him from the ring. Asai locked in a really nice short arm scissors at one point too. And then there was this beautiful takedown by Casas:

While we're at it, check out this double corner dropkick by Casas:

This was back and forth but never felt haphazard. The transitions were good and made sense. For instance, Casas lost the offense there by going for a third dropkick in the opposite corner and Asai moving. Asai, on the other hand, lost it a couple of times by going for his moonsault back off the ropes (or off the top) too early, allowing Casas to take advantage. It was after a missed one that Casas started on the leg, including a well-worked half crab and Scorpion Deathlock.

They moved into the finishing stretch after a ridiculous Casas spinning kick (like a Trouble in Paradise but barely hit; that's one thing about Casas: he'd try new things all the times, but if they didn't work, he didn't keep doing them), a huge plancha, and a nasty suplex into chairs that we barely saw. The stretch was very solid, a few big moves and logical counters, leading up to Asai finally hitting his moonsault off the ropes, and locking in a German.

It's generally tough for me to get a handle on a one-fall title match (and this write up probably showed as such). This didn't have the ebbs and flows that you might see in more traditional ones, but it was grounded enough in its own reality and the struggle was palpable enough that I enjoyed it quite a bit. If you haven't seen it, you should check it out.