Aaron Henare scores career first main event win

The main event of April 18’s Road to Wrestling Dontaku card saw a pair of previews of Hiroshima singles matches as Tetsuya Naito and SANADA of Los Ingobernables De Japon teamed up against their United Empire opponents Aaron Henare and Great-O-Khan. 

After last Thursday’s tag encounter saw Naito taunt O-Khan with an excessively long entrance, El Ingobernable went through the same routien again before the main event, demanding Hiromu Takahashi step up from ringside to disinfect the ropes and hold the ropes open for him. O-Khan was quick to assert that the mind games hadn’t worked however, immediately going for Naito and taking him to the outside, while Henare applied rigorous punishment to SANADA on the floor. 

Back in ring, SANADA kept his cool, and gracefully played to the crowd while the frustrated Henare was thrown off. Henare would tag out to O-Khan, but this time it was the Eliminator taking the pace, dropping to the floor and making Naito wait. Showing his back to Naito, O-Khan mocked his Hiroshima opponent, but when it came to blows, the United Empire member had the advantage, baiting his opponent into a knee bar that had Naito scrambling for the ropes. 

O-Khan kept up the pressure on Naito’s knee outside, ramming it  into the ringside steel, while Henare worsened the damage by targeting the ankle to boot. Adding humiliation to the pain, O-Khan would sit on his Naito ‘throne’ in the corner, before Henare unloaded right hands in the mount on the LIJ leader, transitioning to an Achilles hold that had Naito screaming out before SANADA made the save. 

Naito finally bought himself enough time to bring SANADA in legally with a neckbreaker, and Cold Skull flowed effortlessly from a basement dropkick on Henare to a plancha on O-Khan. The Paradise Lock had Henare trapped, but Henare would fire back with a corner knee and Rugby Punt, before the Berzerker Bomb at the 10 minute mark allowed for the tag to O-Khan. 

O-Khan would land a run of Mongolian Chops to SANADA, but got caught with a Frankensteiner that led to a Naito tag. A double leg Nelson cranking the neck of his opponent, and Naito seemed to gain more characteristic confidence in the face of O-Khan, but pride led to a fall, and a judo takedown from the Dominator before being hung in the Tree of Woe. With a dropkick to the face of Naito, O-Khan stayed in control, and read one potantial counter from his opponent, but a bearhug was reversed into a Naito DDT, and a tag brought fresh members from each side into the middle. 

Henare and SANADA stepped the pace and intensity up, Henare effortlessly muscling SANADA up and dropping him hard to the mat before connecting with O-Khan for an offensive sequence that ended with a punishing Rugby Punt. The Rampage Tackle planted Cold Skull for two, and Henare went for the Streets of Rage; a move Naito would break up, allowing for a TKO that got a nearfall. 

As O-Khan and Naito fought to the floor, SANADA went for a moonsault finish, but missed as the match broke down and bodies flew. A Teep Kick took down Naito, and SANADA once again looked for his new finish on SANADA, turned away before Naito and O-Khan again tore into one another.

Back to his feet, Henare once more wanted Streets of Rage, but was countered into an O’Connor Roll and Skull End. O-Khan again made the cut however, and dealt an Eliminator to SANADA. Henare landed the finish and scored his second pinfall victory over SANADA. As O-Khan proclaimed the strength of the United Empire post match, and after a semi final loss for Shingo Takagi and BUSHI earlier in the night, Los Ingobernables De Japon were left to lick their wounds, and come up with a new strategy.