[1991-05-10-UWFi-Moving On 1] Nobuhiko Takada vs Tom Burton

[GOTNW]

This was a pretty brilliant way of Takada putting himself over. Burton is an amateur guy whose skills here are limited to takedowns and slams, and even when he would do something on offence Takada was never lost, if he'd get taken down he'd keep a hold of Burton's limb and prevent him from taking advantage of it. Burton's selling here was as "big" as it can get in a shoot style match that I still like it, and with the narrative of Takada possessing superior technique it totally worked for me. This was also evident in Takada not having much trouble in escaping from Burton's submissions while scoring the win the first time he grabbed a bigger hold (and the slam he gave Burton before it just screamed "Takada #1"). Also Takada stiffed Burton with some really nice palm strikes and head kicks which I'll always love. ***1/4

[superkix]

Dumb fun. Takada’s like "okay whatever" through most of the match and Tom looks like the bouncer at an east Texas strip club. Loved Burton’s reaction to that first leg kick and I thought he did a goob job of selling Takada's submissions. Doesn’t really do much in there for awhile -- Takada lets him have it with a rush of strikes and Tom slams him down and sits there. But it does pick up toward the end. Tom dumps Takada with a German  and sits down with the single leg crab. Nice finish from Takada with a great waterwheel slam to set up the crab hold.