Note: this tape is two hours long, which means the whole tournament is not shown, only selected matches. Fortunately, the best stuff is here.

DEAN MALENKO & TOKIMITZU ISHIZAWA VS. SHOICHI FUNAKI & YUKI ISHIKAWA

This'll be mat based completely. Ishizawa and Ishikawa in to start, they roll around, in comes Malenko to teach Ishikawa a few things. Malenko works the keylock, Kawa with an armbar, stand off, and Wellll, It's a small sho comes in. Dean rolls around with him to a standoff over a kneebar, and here's Ishizawa. He and Funaki go at it hard in a quasi-shoot fashion, and it's hard strikes all around. Really hard strikes. Malenko back in to work on Sho's leg, and he dominates with strong mat work. Quick tags from Ka Shin and Malenko, and they trap Sho briefly. Tag to Ishikawa and he and Ka Shin go to striking. Malenko in and he takes over on Ishikawa with a dropkick, but gets caught with a kneebar. Funaki in, but Dean catches him with an achillies tendon hold. Rope break, and Sho gets a German suplex. Brawl in the ring, and Malenko gets a tiger driver and the Texas cloverleaf on Sho for the tap and win at 8:13. Decent little match with a bit of leg-work psychology and good stiff work all around. Dean and Sho carried it. **1/4.

MASAYOSHI MOTEGI & KAMIKAZE VS. "FLYING" SCORPIO AND EL SAMURAI

Behold again the Motegi rule of Japanese juniors tournaments: he's in all of 'em. No one really knows why either, because he's really no good a'tall. Oh well. Samurai and Motegi start with matwork, standard armbar/wristlock reversals, and Motegi gets a kneedrop. Samurai reverses a chinlock and brings in Scorpio, and Motegi tags in Kamikaze. He's a masked guy, and I have no idea who he is. I've never seen him anywhere else save this tape. He and Scorpio go at it, standard dueling double kip-up wristlock reversals, and now hard strikes from both men. And then Kamikaze works his way into my heart by making Scorpio look like an utter buffoon. He simply takes one step back as Scorp attempts a dropkick, and makes him whiff by about two feet. Funny stuff, and completely logical. Lariat hit-and miss sequence sees Scorp hit a leaping side kick and Samurai comes in. Piledriver! Reverse neckbreaker, and then a stunner sold like a face rake. THUNDER FIRE POWERBOMB! That's actually a finisher for a lot of guys, and it came out of no where. Weird match flow here. Motegi breaks up the pin. Samurai and Scorp double team Kamikaze and a Vader bomb from Scorp nets 2. A Scorp front powerslam produces 2 _ for Samurai. BACKDROP DRIVER gets 2 _. Kamikaze, in keeping with the technical flow of this match, hits the double reverse inverted ball shot to get some space, and takes over offense on Samurai with hard strikes. In comes Motegi, and he runs through some vanilla offense until Samurai bulls him into the corner and tags Scorpio. Motegi tips up in the corner on a whip, ducks a lariat, and hits a springboard body press. Scorpio rolls through and hits a slam and a standing front somersault leg drop for a big pop and a two count. Standing backflip splash for 2 _. Samurai in, to get caught by Motegi with a snap suplex. Kamikaze in with a diving headbutt, and Scorpio breaks up a fisherman's suplex at 2 _. Second rope legdrop by Scorpio on Kamikaze's knee, which gets a working over. Samurai German for 2. He tries the thunder fire again, but gets backdropped. Motegi in and he and Samurai do a pure lucha segment concluding with a Motegi tope, then a Scorpio plancha over the top. Kamikaze with a somersault plancha, and that's the full lucha trainwreck spot. Inside Motegi hits rolling Germans on Samurai, and he and Kamikaze try some tandem offense broken up by Scorpio with a slingshot double lariat. Samurai misses the flying splash and Kamikaze hits a bodyblock variation of the doomsday device, then a sit out powerbomb. He and Samurai blow a rana spot, then hit it giving Kamikaze 2. Sammy rolls through under a spin kick and hits the lariat, then tags Scorpio for a moonsault for 2. Sammy and Scorp hit the tandem kicks, and a Scorp 450 finishes at 13:47. Good slow build to the big spots other than Samurai's odd lapse in the middle, only a few blown spots, and good stuff in most areas with nifty highspots. ***1/4.

TAKA MICHINOKU & SUPER DELFIN VS. GRAN HAMADA & NORIO HONAGA

TAKA and Delphin are both good at this point, though green as all hell. TAKA notably busts out the goofy mushroom hat here from J Cup '94. Hamada is the world's best wrestling grandpa, and the only wrestler in history to hold a tag title with his daughter as a partner. Honaga blows, and lustily. Honaga and TAKA roll around the mat to begin, and TAKA gets the best of that with a variety of half crabs and Lion Tamers. Side backbreaker, and now a chinlock, which Honaga breaks by BITING TAKA's THUMB. OUCH. Honaga actually works the thumb for awhile, then tags in Hamada, who beats up TAKA with slams and stomps, and copious chinlockery. Delfin in, and the Michinoku pro influence is everywhere as all of these guys spent time there other than Honaga. Team H beats on Delfin with kicks and such, and a rope-style gutbuster for 2. Rope running sequence ends with a Delfin dropkick and TAKA comes in to whup on everyone. He teases the springboard plancha, but backflips off the top rope and styles in the ring. TAKA rules. Team H take him down though until he hits a belly-to-belly. Hamada comes back with his own suplex, then Honaga in with a crab. Delfin breaks it up. Hamada in to put the beats to TAKA again, and he hits the headscissors on the ground. Quick tag offense here from both teams. Delfin in with the released double underhook suplex. Team young punks hit awesome tandem offense, a tree of woe choke/nutstand combo and a snap suplex springboard splash combo for 2. Tremendous. Back and forth all over here to let both teams showcase their offense, with quick tags to maintain good selling of the same. Team punks clear the ring and hit a Delfin pescado and a TAKA springboard plancha, but Honaga comes back in for a pescado of his own, which misses. LUCHA TRAINWRECK~! Is in full effect as Delfin nails a plancha from the top turnbuckle. Back in a spin slam and powerbomb from Hamada on TAKA nets 2 _. Backdrop driver finishes for team H at 13:37. Fun little MPro style match with good selling, nice flow, excellent highspots and WACKY THUMB BITING~! ***1/4

BLACK TIGER & GREAT SASUKE VS. CHRIS BENOIT & SHINJIRO OHTANI

Strap yourself in for the first of two awesome matches between these teams. Everyone here rocks hard, Hard, HARD, and border on being true legends of juniors wrestling. Chris and Eddie start with matwork galore, quicker, stiffer and more realistic than anyone else's so far. The try the knucklelock and Benoit bridges up, but Eddie hits a headscissors to throw him. Benoit tags in Ohtani, who works Eddie down to the mat. Eddie escapes and brings in Sasuke. He and Ohtani duel on the mat, and Ohtani plays subtle heel, using a mask pull to control. Armbreaker, and here's Benoit to maul Sasuke. They do a running sequence with Sasuke rolling through an attempted monkey flip, but Benoit breaks up this trademark sequence with a LARIAT. I believe this was after J Cup '94, so this is a brilliant bit of psychology playing off the familiarity these men had with each other after their extraordinary match in the finals there. Benoit does his amazing selling trick of shaking out the lariat arm, selling the force of his own blow. Sasuke ducks a lariat and hits a leaping spin kick, and both men tag out. Tiger pokes Ohtani in the eyes and runs through the typical Eddie sequence of face grind- slingshot senton. Sasuke in and Ohtani is set up for a Sasuke lariat by being forced to leap over a sprawling Eddie on a whip. Sasuke with a surfboard, and Ohtani has this marvelous look of vague annoyance at being out wrestled on his face. He hits a series of kicks to break, starting with a forward flip back kick. Rope running sequence, and Sasuke's hiptoss is blocked with a lariat. He backflips off the turnbuckle to avoid a cross corner whip, hits a backdrop and a kick, and teases a plancha on the bailing Ohtani. Eddie in as Ohtani stalls. Off the ropes and Eddie gets a lariat, but Ohtani blocks a press slam with a rollup for 1. Eddie stays on top and Ohtani bumps off the corner. Sasuke in, snap suplex, keylock, try at a cross armbreaker blocked by a face grind from the standing Guerrero, and here's Benoit. Back elbow, German for 2 _. Snap suplex for 2, broken by Eddie. ENORMOUS Benoit powerbomb for 2 _ broken by Eddie. Benoit's pissed, and Eddie invites him out. Instead, Benoit brings in Ohtani, who hits the spinning heel kick. Eddie walks across the ring and pokes Ohtani in the eye to break a crab. Benoit in and he puts the sharpshooter on Sasuke, then nails Eddie as he comes in to break the hold. Eddie nails Benoit from behind, then punches his own partner and yells at him. Ohtani then bounces Eddie and takes over on Sasuke with a jumping tombstone. Quick tag offense, and Benoit hits the backdrop superplex for an Eddie interrupted 2 _. Benoit bounces Eddie's head off the post to get rid of him, and Ohtani hits a powerbomb broken again by Guerrero for 2 _. Benoit maneuvers Sasuke into a dragon suplex assisted by Ohtani's kick to the throat for 2 _, broken again by Black Tiger. Benoit suplexes Eddie over the top and hits a grotesque powerbomb assisted by Ohtani's springboard dropkick... for 2 9/10, broken again by Eddie. They need to get rid of him to win. Eddie doges a lariat and a spin kick, bounces Ohtani, goes up top for a plancha but gets caught from behind by Benoit. But Sasuke catches Benoit and gets him up on his shoulders, Benoit reverses to the same position but with Sasuke on his shoulders, then Sasuke gets a rollup FOR THREE! Match went 13:11. Awesome psychology and build, and phenomenal selling. The way they use quick tags to emphasis the need for rest and to make the tag stip meaningful is great. All four guys do phenomenal work, everything looking crisp and sudden, not like pre-planned spots at all. All four men truly excel at making this appear to be actual cmpetition, as opposed to simple athletic exhibition or performance. Only real flaw is the out-of-no-where ending which more or less contravened the storyline of the need to take out Eddie they had built to then. To a degree it makes sense as a story since Eddie bought Sasuke enough time to recover and hit the rollup, but still. ****1/2.