80s Joshi on Wednesday: Chigusa! Noriyo!

Volume 4 

1. Chigusa Nagayo vs. Noriyo Tateno (AJW Junior Title) - 8/10/82

K: There’s a story around this match that gives it a little bit of historical significance. This was the biggest match in either woman’s career to this point. Chigusa had won the Junior Title a few months earlier in a decision match against Itsuki Yamazaki. Everyone backstage thought she’d beat Noriyo here as she was 2 years in and Noriyo only 1. That she lost was a such an embarrassment that she said she was quitting wrestling and went to see her parents rather than take the bus with the rest of the roster back to Tokyo. She’d be back of course.

The match is better than the average rookie outing. Chigusa does a couple of Jackie Sato style thrusting big boots to the chest, which is interesting when Lioness Asuka was the one billed as ‘Jackie Jr’ for their similarities. There’s a nice moment where Noriyo Tateno goes in for either a very low flying crossbody or a very high dropdown trip; but either way Chigusa had to quickly jump quite high to avoid it. A nice bit of sloppiness that makes things not look rehearsed. 

It’s also noteworthy that Chigusa already has a bit of fanclub going and they’re quite loudly chanting NA-GA-YO for her. There’s a popular perception that Chigusa’s rise to stardom came with the armies of cheering schoolgirls who started packing out the shows in 1984, but that’s not quite the full story. Even when the fanbase was mostly adult men (though it was a lot mixed than current Joshi) she was getting more popular than her push.

**1/4

MD: It’s important to know that the flowers today were provided by the Nagakusa Park Association and Fukushima Television. Noriyo is 16 here as they are happy to point out repeatedly on commentary. Nagayo has about a year on her. I get that this isn’t uncommon in this footage, but that doesn’t make it less striking when you stop and think about it sometimes. Case in point, they were both also given giant stuffed bears as well.

This was certainly sprinty. Tateno tried for an early attack with a dropkick, but Nagayo was more or less able to defuse much of what she tried. She just couldn’t press much of an advantage herself. When she did, the match was a little better and a little more grounded. At one point she did this sort of curb stomp where the legs were further back than usual as she all but stepped on them. And then she did hit her spin kick at one point too. 

Really though, the strength of this one was just in how they shifted from one hold to the next and kept things moving and competitive. That came into play at the end as Tateno was able to muscle it out and get Nagayo down for the three and the title. We’ve heard of guys legitimately working in the start of the match like in Florida or pretending to do so for extra money like in Oregon but the idea that you work an entire match and then the finish is based on a shoot is still so mindboggling to modern brains (or at least it is to my own). But it does make things unpredictable to say the least. In a match like this where there wasn’t any sort of clear narrative they were following save for that these two were pretty equally matched, it fit well enough, I suppose. It did give this all a bit of a weird feel since Chigusa had a local cheering section and got a chant once, for instance. I guess it all worked out for these two in the end though.

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