Tuesday is French Catch Day: Rene Ben! Cesca! Inca! Tejero! Delaporte! Pat O'Conner?

Rene Ben Chemoul/Gilbert Cesca vs. Inca Peruano/Anton Tejero 3/12/65 pt1, pt2

PAS: We reviewed this back in 2014. It's still great and I thought I would add some new thoughts. We all know now that Peruano, Cesca and Chemoul are all time greats, but Tejero is a guy we have seen much less of, but really impressed me here. He had so much energy, just a crazed frantic bump machine, he must have taken 20-25 bumps to the floor in this match, and flew around the ring like a dervish. I still think in context the match is an all timer, wild workrate tag with more frenetic action then you would see 20 years later. 

MD: Phil and Eric thought highly enough of this to make it the 65 MOTY but we know a lot more now. I thought we saw a tag in the last week or two which felt evolutionary in the structure. This did not, but it took so many of the fun comeuppance spots we've seen up until now and pushed them all forward. I don't think I've ever seen a match where so many people got tossed to the floor in new and interesting ways. While Cesca and Tejero were both very good here (and Cesca probably excellent with Tejero an ideal second banana stooge), Ben Chemoul and Peruano are just transcendent wrestlers. Peruano, by this point in his career (and we've been watching him for almost ten years now), made it look so easy. I've never seen someone that could bump into being tied up into the ropes from an awkward angle on a mule kick out of a hold reversal and make it look so natural. Most of his complex spots seem like they were worked out on the fly and that they were wholly organic. Obviously they weren't, but he's a singular figure in pro wrestling in making them seem so. Ben Chemoul is just electric and elastic. He bounds around the ring with this energy that you just can't look away from. And they both bring so many interesting and creative spots and sequences and ways to move around the ring. This had a couple of firsts, like the first time we've seen someone remove the protective covering in front of the post (Peruano did it and then paid for it) and one of the first double collisions which, in this case, led to a 10 count finish. It needed a little bit more heat, probably, though the swarming double teams and tandem attacks from Peruano and Tejero were almost enough to overcome that even in their relative sparsity. In general though, it was wild, heated chaos and constantly entertaining with two of the best stylized wrestlers of French Catch. It'll be curious to see if it holds up as we have over 20 matches for the year.

SR: 2/3 falls match going a bit over 30 minutes. We've had this before, it was an incredible discovery 7 years ago, and it's still pretty incredible even after watching a load of high end French pro wrestling. These tags were clearly turning into an artform at this point. We saw the Black Diamonds put a British touch on a while before, and now we get something more luchaesque thanks to Peruano and Tejero. That means lots of high end bumping and stooging, as well as violent rudo beatdowns, and plenty cool wrestling. The bumping was just insanely high end, just an effortless, tiredless exercise in flying all over the ring, through the ropes and sometimes upside down into a tie up. The beatdowns were pretty nasty and unpredictable with both Peruvians diving off the top, tying up their opponents, throwing rough knees and punches and being generally quite spectacular dickheads. There wasn't a ton of wrestling but what we got was slick and fast. Dug those hammerlocked backbreakers the Inca busted out. Chemoul and Cesca are impeccable both throwing out fast armdrags and then punching the rudos in the face when they had enough. The fast and beautiful wrestling exchanges add some depth and the escalation throughout the match, building to the faces throwing punches and the eventual brutal finish were great. Really, still an all timer of a match.

Yasu Yoguchi vs. Mathias Sanchez  3/14/65

MD: We get the last five minutes of this. Yoguchi may be Chati Yokouchi and if so we'll see him once more. He was in the face role here and I liked his chop and nervehold offense in a short setting. He worked well from underneath, sold well (including post-match) and the fans were into him. A lot of that was probably due to Sanchez being such a character. We'll never see him again, which is a shame. He was super emotive in the nerve hold and celebratory after smaller things. Just a real colorful jerk, the sort who got at least some stuff thrown at him. Five minutes and never to be seen again.

SR: JIP with about 4 minutes shown. Yoguchi likes to throw chops. Sanchez likes to throw fists. Super simple match, but there was a nasty bump where Sanchez threw Yoguchi over the ropes with the belly to belly and Yoguchi took the nasty apron bump. I enjoyed this.

Pat O‘Connor vs. Roger Delaporte 3/14/65

MD: In some ways this felt like one of the most rudimentary matches we've seen, barely even in the French style. Obviously, that's not going to be fully true since we had Delaporte in there, but O'Connor was all punches and forearms and the occasional ear grab, really. Delaporte controlled early with his fall-away armdrags where he controls the head. He does them differently than most people and I usually enjoy them, especially when he strikes them together like this. Whenever O'Connor started to get an advantage, he'd hesitate allowing Delaporte to go low and take back over. That led into an extended period of Delaporte working over the leg (after snatching a leg from behind after O'Connor turned to break clean) including a proto STF and those bouncing leg lunches off the ropes. This was also one of the first attempts we've seen of a heel outright using the rope for leverage by putting his own feet on it. Also, plenty of kicks and stomps. It wasn't until he tossed the ref away that O'Connor found his fire and started to hammer back. O'Connor was best when beating Delaporte around the ring, as his strikes were heavy (though the leg selling obviously went away) and he wasn't hesitating like before. There were a few typical but highly enjoyable spots of Delaporte flying into the crowd or begging off by hugging the ref, right down to overselling the airplane spin after the pin. There was nothing wrong with this but it lacked some of the flair that's become absolutely commonplace in these matches. Whether or not O'Connor was actually O'Connor, they treated him that way, between billing him as a world champion, having him win clean in the center against Delaporte, and then with the handshake and hand-raising after the match. It makes me wonder if they weren't trying to work the crowd.

SR: Match goes about 20 minutes. This was another case of The Roger Delaporte Show. It's no better or worse than other Delaporte matches you've seen, so whether or not you want to watch this depends on whether you are in the mood for it. Regardless, Delaporte was at his despicable best here, and Pat O'Connor didn't do much besides be a big lug who can hit nice uppercuts and punches. Regardless of the predictable nature of the bout I thought there some lots of great strike exchanges here. yes, yes, that's not a huge standout criteria among French matches... but I enjoyed the show.