Under Siege main event sees Ishii meet Josh Alexander

The main event of IMPACT’s Under Siege event this Saturday night saw Tomohiro Ishii challenge Josh Alexander for the IMPACT World Championship, Ishii’s first such challenge, and second title match in a one week span after battling Hiroshi Tanahashi over the IWGP United States Championship at Dontaku. 

Showing his expert fundamentals, Alexander would gain the upper hand when grappling early, and found a pair of armdrags, before Ishii showed his brute strength. Still, the Walking Weapon would respond to hard strikes with a tackle of his own to take down the challenger and wasn’t afraid to trade with the Stone Pitbull, perhaps to his deficit as Ishii took over in the corner.  

Using his long legs and reach advantage, Alexander would slow Ishii with a big boot before finding a low cross body through the ropes to the floor. Ishii’s resilience would be put to the test when a hat trick of German suplexes and knee drop to the back of the head would only get two; a powerslam later and champion adn challenger started to throw bombs to the delight of the crowd. 

Switching tactics, Alexander would go down to the ankle of Ishii. The ankle lock would do its damage, ensuring that an Ishii counter to the C4 Spike was impossible to follow up on, and with Ishii a half step slowed, the champion could rock the CHAOS member with a right hand as Ishii wanted a headbutt. Ishii again resisted the C4 Spike, and roared back in the face of an Alexander Chaos Theory, but found himself muscled into the corner as the champion ascended to the middle rope. 

There Ishii would work his way out and landed a rocket headbutt to Alexander’s jaw. A superplex followed, but the Walking Weapon showed his  own toughness with a kickout at two; a powerbomb backbreaker landed, but a moonsault would only find empty canvas. With both men desperate to finish the match any way they could in their favour, reversals went back and forth, but it was a powerbomb to Ishii and the C4 that sealed the victory. 

Also at Under Siege, ten man tag team action saw Jay White, the Good Brothers, Chris Bey and El Phantasmo of BULLET CLUB take on Honor No More, represented by Eddie Edwards, Kenny King, Matt Taven, Vincent and Mike Bennett. With the two factions having been at loggerheads for weeks, the match quickly became a wild brawl before Edwards was controlled in the BULLET CLUB corner as the match settled down. King would fare better though, and was able to separate Phantasmo from his allies, bringing ELP to the Honor No More corner.

After trading barbs online about their respective statuses as champions at the G1 Supercard in Madison Square Garden three years earlier, Jay White and Matt Taven had a score to settle, and BULLET CLUB took great delight in raking Taven’s back until Bennett had seen enough. Honor No More would take over on Anderson on the back of Bennett’s interference, and a superkick to Gallows slowed the big LG as well, but Bey and ELP’s athleticism and double teamwork would grant a nearfall on Vincent. 

After White came close to victory on Taven, a Bladerunner was denied by the HNM team, and the match broke down once again. First Bey and then Vincent dove to the floor, but when Anderson climbed the ropes, he was distracted by his perpetual soft spot for Maria Kanellis, and Taven and Bennett capitalized with the Proton Pack double team for the victory.