TOKYO, Oct. 14 — With the fifth annual World Dental Symposium going on right next door, Shooto promoter Sustain really went all out this year and rented the absolutely gorgeous Yokohama Pacifico National Convention Center to play host to the promotion’s second big event in 2006: The Champion Carnival.
Shooto generally holds their big summer event in August, but this year, due to the conflicting schedule of PRIDE Bushido, the promotion opted to push it back to October. Despite the rub against tradition, this card was certainly worth waiting for, with four champions from four different weight classes competing.
The main event pitted Shooto’s welterweight (154 pounds) champion, Tatsuya Kawajiri (Pictures) against Swedish MMA fighter Per Eklund in a non-title bout.
Kawajiri’s last appearance in Shooto was full of misfortune, as the powerful champion took a victory by disqualification after suffering a bout-ending kick to the groin from Norwegian nightmare Joachim Hansen (Pictures) at the eight second mark of their title fight. Since then “The Crusher” earned two dominant victories in Bushido.
Eklund had only suffered one lost prior to tonight’s event and scored his most recent victory against Shooto Europe champion David Baron (Pictures) in May.
Eklund came out kicking at the champion and quickly went for a takedown. Kawajiri sprawled and pushed the Swedish fighter to the mat. Despite some pretty slick ground movement from Eklund, Kawajiri pretty much controlled the pace of the fight, working to side and eventually scoring the mount.
At one point the Kawajiri managed to control Eklund’s movement by manipulating his arms into a modified crucifix from the top before regaining the mount.
Once solidly sitting atop his opponent, the Shooto welterweight champion began to fire down hard punches to Eklund’s head. The Swedish fighter twisted in an attempt to avoid the blows, but there was no escape. Eventually the referee had seen enough and called an end to the bout at 4:10 of the first.
The only title bout of the evening a was a rematch between charismatic Shooto bantamweight (123 pounds) champion Mamoru Yamaguchi (Pictures) and AACC fighter Shinichi Kojima (Pictures). The last time this two fought at Korakuen Hall in March, the fight ended in a draw.
The afro-coiffed Mamoru isn’t really what you’d call a “mat wizard” — he has enough ground game to defend against submissions and an incredible talent of getting back to his feet after takedowns, allowing him to use his very strong stand-up skills and rapid fire knees from the clinch to score the victory against his opponents.
After some brief trading on the feet, “BJ” Kojima secured a clinch in the corner and managed to scramble behind his opponent. From here the AACC fighter jumped up onto Mamoru’s back and tried to sink in a choke. The champion defended the technique by lowering his chin, but eventually fell to the mat as Kojima tightened up the technique.
Mamoru held on for a few seconds more, but the choke was on too tight and he eventually passed out at the 1:38 mark of the first. With the victory, Kojima was crowned the new Shooto bantamweight champion. For Mamoru, the loss dropped him to a disappointing 0-1-2 in title defenses.
Shooto middleweight (167 pounds) champion Shinya Aoki (Pictures) pulled a page out of his friend and training partner’s Mazakazu Imanari’s playbook, tirelessly going for leg submissions in his fight against Australian jiu-jitsu fighter George Sotiropoulos. In fact, the entire first round of his bout was a leg submission war, with both fighters trying to apply heelhooks and ankle locks.
But after a competitive first round, disaster struck in the second. After the bell rang, Sotiropoulos came flying out of his corner with a low kick that inadvertently struck Aoki hard in the groin. The middleweight champion went down in agony and remained there for several minutes until it was clear that he could not continue.
The fight was ruled a disqualification against Sotiropoulos, making it the second time this year that a big fight on a Shooto super-card has been derailed by a groin strike. The first, of course, was the infamous groin shot in the opening seconds of the main event title fight between Joachim Hansen (Pictures) and Tatsuya Kawajiri (Pictures) back in February.
The impact of this kick was so severe that Aoki couldn’t walk and had to be helped from the ring. It is not known how this will affect the jiu-jitsu ace’s scheduled fight with Gilbert Melendez (Pictures) a little over two weeks from now in Bushido.
Recently crowned Shooto lightweight champion “Lion” Takeshi Inoue (Pictures) faced off against Sweden’s Navid Yousefi in a non-title bout. This was Inoue’s third fight since winning the vacated title against Antonio Carvalho (Pictures) last May.
The impressive thing about Inoue is the way he moves in the ring — he has excellent footwork, is always up on his toes avoiding punishment, and is quite skilled at slipping punches. His boxing is crisp and his low kicks are fast and accurate.
Both fighters looked good on there feet, and at times were willing to forgo technical boxing to slug it out with each other. In the second round Inoue landed a lightning fast low kick that sent Yousefi down for an eight-count.
Sensing that he’d done some damage, the Japanese fighter immediately rushed in and forced Yousefi down to the mat. From here Inoue got to the side, then took the Swede’s back and finally laid in a rear-naked choke at the 4:35 mark for the victory.
Killer Bee fighter Akira Kikuchi (Pictures) made his first appearance back to the Shooto ring since losing the middleweight title to Shinya Aoki (Pictures) last February. His opponent on his night was Hawaiian native and No. 2 ranked Shooto competitor Ronald Jhun (Pictures).
Kikuchi scored a takedown early and eventually worked his way around Jhun’s guard to side-control. From here the former champion applied a step-over triangle and stretched out Jhun’s free arm for the armbar victory at 1:58 of the first.
Things did not go well for Swedish fighter David Lejenas once he went to the mat with former Shooto featherweight champion Ryota Matsune (Pictures). The Paraestra Matsudo fighter maintained ground control throughout, passing the guard and taking side and mount. As Lejenas twisted to get out from the bottom, Matsune took his back. The Swedish fighter rolled in an attempt to shake his opponent, but Matsune held on and applied a rear-naked choke for the victory at the 4:09 mark of the first.
Fourth ranked Takashi Nakakura (Pictures) and No. 9 ranked Ganjo Tentsuku (Pictures) fought a real back-and-forth battle. The second round saw Nakakura connect with knees and overhand hook, staggering his opponent badly and nearly ending the fight. But in the third round Tentsuku came back and pounded Nakakura from the guard. The fighters traded punches in the final moments before the bell. The fight went to the judges and was ruled a draw.
Akiyo Nishiura (Pictures) scored a decision victory over Daisuke Ishizawa (Pictures).
Yuki Konishi took the decision in his bout against Yoshitaro Niimi.