Last night, Wayne, Ad and I went to watch Pro Wrestling NOAH's first ever UK show. NOAH are one of the top two Japanese promotions, and are the only one to really looking to expand into other markets. Aside from one rubbishy show in Oxford a few years ago, this was (incredibly) my first live wrestling event. It was really great.

The first thing I realised is how much more involved I got with the matches, compared to watching on DVD. I won't often audibly react to recorded wrestling, but I must have jumped out of my seat a dozen times last night, and involuntarily shouted variations on 'oooohh' or 'woooah' countless times more. To be expected, perhaps - the same thing happens with live comedy - and NOAH's high-impact style naturally creates such reactions.

Wayne and Ad agreed with my basic point about Japanese wrestling - compared to it's US equivalent, the standard is consistently high, and the performers are generally much harder working. In almost all the matches, it would be hard to argue that the guys weren't give the effort the audience hoped for, and frequently exceeded it. Match of the night was clearly KENTA and Ishimori vs. Bryan Danielson and Eddie Edwards. This was exhausting just to watch: nearly 30 minutes in length, they built through the first fifteen minutes with the opening flurries and the heat section on Ishimori, before they hit the finishing straight of finishers and finishers and finishers. Everything was at top speed and super smooth. KENTA made me wince about fifty or sixty times with these brutal kicks, and his finishing knee strike to Edwards probably broke his face - no mean feat since I'm pretty sure he broke his face early in the match with a nasty looking kick.

This match totally sold me on Danielson as 'best in the world'. From immediately establishing himself as heel, drawing boos from an audience that would have gladly loved him, and following that up acts of cowardice that drew further ire from the crowd, I realised that not only is he the best technical wrestler on the planet, but he's now the complete package.

The other top match was the main event - Kenta Kobashi and Go Shiozaki vs. Mitsuharu Misawa and Naomichi Marufuji. Just to be so close to two of the most celebrated wrestlers of the last twenty years was AWESOME - Misawa may be broken down and Kobashi is also showing his age, but really that just added to the richness of the match - they play the tired, grizzled veterans, and while they may only have a couple of weapons in their arsenal, but they both use their strikes to maximum effect. Kobashi's corner chops drew a standing ovation. Meanwhile, Marafuji works for four men, bumping around the ring, acting as a huge jerk to Kobashi, and then running the length of the entrance ramp, leaping over the top rope and delivering a huge, breath-taking dropkick. Go's game too - his moonsault, for a big guy, was glorious.

The rest of the card featured a number of very good matches - Nigel McGuinness was really great in his tag match, and I really enjoyed opener Joel Redman vs. Atushi Aoki. Morishima was working injured, regrettably, because I really wanted to see the future company ace in full flow. That said, his one big lariat was killer.

The event was recorded, and I'll probably buy it on DVD. I suspect, if I hadn't seen it live, I wouldn't have thought it were quite so great. The juniors tag, in particular, would certainly have been judged too long and slightly overkill-y. But I did - and I'm all in favour of anything that make me enjoy things more.