Dynamic Thunder Connection
Match: 儛島エマ (Ema Maishima) vs 古沢稀杏 (Kikyo Furusawa) (10:00)
Company: World Wonder Ring Stardom (STARDOM)
Year: 2025
Event: Stardom New Blood 24
Ramble Time
You know that saying, “When Life gives you lemons, you make lemonade”. Yeah, life gave me lemons and I thought I should make some lemonade even though I have never drank that much in my life. That doesn't mean I hate lemonade, I just… never tried much of it. Wait a minute, why am I writing about this again? Oh yeah. Anyway, back to the topic at hand.
On June 13th, I did an article on two wrestlers, Ema Maishima and Kikyo Furusawa. That article was about their first ever matches that happened on the May 21st Korakuen Hall show. Ema Maishima would face AZM (Azumi) in the opener while Kikyo Furusawa took on 羽南 (Hanan). I was planning on making a second article about these two in May of next year. I thought that it would be an appropriate time since it will be the first full year as pro wrestlers by the time we get to May 2026. Much like everything in my catalog, plans changed. This time, it wasn’t my plans that changed, but I just added another article to my original plans.
On Oct 2nd, Stardom announced that Ema Maishima and Kikyo Furusawa will have their first ever singles match against each other. Now you can see why I decided to write about this article. I never thought it would happen this early, but to see these two go one on one is always going to catch my attention. How did this fight play out? Well my friends, let’s take a walk together.
So with that being said, in front of 216 fans at the Belle Salle Shinjuku Grand Hall in Tokyo. In the opening match, it’s Ema Maishima vs Kikyo Furusawa. Let’s roll with it my friends. To the MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON.
Before we start, I did like hearing both their theme songs. I know that it’s just loads of beats with some lyrics, but I enjoyed them. Especially Ema’s one where the beat really does hammer itself home. Also when they shook each other’s hands, both women were on both of their feet. This is possibly a cultural thing about Japanese Pro Wrestling or Japanese culture that I don’t understand. But whenever Ema Maishima or Kikyo Furusawa face other women in singles matches, they always go for a handshake on one knee. It always comes across like they were proposing for marriage. It’s kinda funny.
The bell rings as both women circle around the ring. After linking their hands, Furusawa immediately tries to go for the takedown. Ema notices that quickly as she lowers down her body weight and shifts over into a low waist lock. Furusawa slips out to apply for a Front Chancery. Ema slips out to apply her own Front Chancery and switches that into a Full Mount. From the mount, Ema attempts to lock in an Armbar, but Furusawa keeps a hold of her hands to prevent that and uses that to go for the pin for a two count. They both got up to a vertical base and circled around each other once again. Ema successfully pulled off a Double Leg Takedown onto Furusawa. Furusawa tried to adjust from her position as she went for a Kimura Lock. She uses that to escape the mount and get back on her knees as she moves her arms to switch into a Front Chancery. Furusawa really wrenches that low front headlock and floats over into a low waist lock.
As they both were standing, Ema does a standing switch to apply a waist lock on Furusawa. It didn’t take long for Furusawa to do a standing switch to apply another waist lock on Ema. Ema reverses the waist lock into a wristlock. This is where Furusawa’s understanding of wrestling fundamentals comes into play as she rotates her body towards her so Ema can have less control over her trapped wrist. Then Furusawa uses her free arm to grab Ema’s hand from behind her back to escape the wrist lock while at the same time as applying her own wristlock. I will now personally dub this technique, the Hachi Counter.
Ema forward rolls to reverse the wristlock back into her own wristlock to switch into the hammerlock. Fursawa looked left and right to see an opening as she followed up with back elbows to switch into her own hammerlock. Ema did the same back elbow strategy to escape as she moved around to apply the side headlock. Furusawa uses her right foot to press on her left leg to escape the side headlock. Furusawa floats over into a side headlock and wrenches that in and follows up with another wrist lock to push her back to the ropes. Ema reverses an Irish whip and sends her across the ropes. Furusawa goes under the leapfrog, and forward rolls over the drop down. Once again, the simplest thing comes with different outcomes as mid-roll, Furusawa grabs Ema’s left ankle not only to stop her from standing up, but to trap her in another submission again. Ema realises that quickly and kicks her off to get up to a vertical base. She ducks under Furusawa’s lariat and follows with a dropkick. Ema moves to the white corner as Furusawa crawls to the other to keep herself up.
Ema’s specialty in dropkicks were on display as she dropkicked Furusawa straight to the gut. It didn’t seem to work like intended, because Furusawa was still standing even though she was momentarily stunned. So Ema sweeps her leg to have her seated in the corner. The spirit of Katsuyori Shibata has been installed as Ema runs from one corner back to the same corner and hits a jumping dropkick. I will call this the Maishima Dropkick. Boring? Yes. But I like it and it got a 2 count, so I’m keeping this one until Ema names it herself. When Furusawa reverses an Irish whip and stops it in her tracks, she does a cartwheel into a Tierras onto Ema. And that means… HACHI COUNTER!! She followed it up with a dropkick and tried to go for a bodyslam on Ema. Furusawa wasn’t able to get her up, so she decided to let her go and dropkicked her in the left knee. That was a way for Furusawa to do a backwards roll into an Ankle Lock again. This is definitely going to be one of Furusawa’s main weapons.
Ema rolls through to get out of it and Furusawa begins a strike exchange. That did surprise me given the post match analysis on both of them. As they remained on equal footing, Ema blocked Furusawa’s lariat with her arm and spinned her around to hit a Suplex. Ema starts going after a limp as she hits a double stomp on Furusawa’s back. When she places Furusawa on the middle rope, she hits another running dropkick to her back. Given the back pains I’ve had, that must’ve truly sucked. After a failed attempt, Ema locks in a Full Boston Crab to really damage back, she literally sat on her back like many kids did to their friends when they were little. Kikyo got to the ropes and when Ema grabbed her for the bodyslam, Furusawa reversed it anyway. Furusawa hit another bodyslam for a two count. When she picked her up, Ema went for a lariat. Furusawa ducked underneath, and did a Cartwheel Tierras into a Victory Roll in order to transition to a side leglock. And that means… HACHI COUNTER!! When Ema was getting close to the ropes, Furusawa drags her away as she switches to the Ankle Lock and a Knee bar. When Ema got to the ropes, Furusawa picked her up to try a move of some kind.
Ema got off, and kept hammering at the damaged back to gain some space. Even though it ended up with Ema being on one knee as a result of Furusawa’s submissions earlier. Furusawa went for the kick, but Ema caught it and linked her up in… a half Gory Special submission on one knee. I don’t know, maybe I’ll include a picture of it. (Hope it gets pass the website protocols)
Ema transitioned into another Boston Crab and I know Furusawa’s back is hurting like my bowels. Furusawa reverses another Boston Crab attempt by Ema into a Victory Roll for a two count. When that failed, we had many variations of the Most Devastating in All Of Sports Entertainment, the Surprise Rollup. And you can tell that I was happy even though it was really intense. These two enter into a strike exchange once again. No one won this exchange because the bell rang as they slumped to the mat which means that this fight ends in a draw.
Post Match:
Now that we are done with the match, let’s get into my thoughts on both competitors. I was going to do this type of section in an article I planned for next year in May. I just didn’t expect this singles match to happen, so plans can change. So let’s roll with it:
Kikyo Furusawa: Furusawa is obviously the most technical wrestler of the two. She reminds me a lot of Yuya Uemura from New Japan Pro-Wrestling in a sense where she uses the basic fundamentals to her advantage. She adds her own spins to keep her opponents guessing and catch them off guard on a moment’s notice. As well as target limbs like Robbie Eagles, Yoshinobu Kanemaru or El Desperado, etc for many submissions like the Ankle Lock.
Ema Maishima: Ema is a very different case, unlike Furusawa. She has a lot more pace in her offence and is more prone to go for strikes and kicks like she is fighting for the NEVER Openweight Championship. That is the reason why Furusawa surprised me by starting the strike exchange. Ema is very adaptable to her own surroundings and does her best to knock down her opponent especially in tag team matches.
EDIT: Hello, future Zero here. Sorry to both fans of the website for the big gap in article and big apology to my bosses for other reasons. I know that Ema Maishima and Kikyo Furusawa had another singles match on the 25th NEW BLOOD show. So I will do my best to get that out as soon as possible despite my busy schedule lately.
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