Ayako Hamada Returns To Japan For VENY’s Bloom Show

Legendary Joshi wrestler Ayako Hamada will make her return to Japan after over eight years to wrestle in the main event of VENY’s upcoming Produce event, Bloom.

Emanating from the legendary Korakuen Hall, Bloom will serve as VENY’s 11 anniversary show. The show will have six matches and feature some of her best allies, rivals, and legends of Joshi.

The first match of the evening will have freelancer Itsuki Aoki team up with Sendai Girls’ Ryo Mizunami against freelancer Rina Amikura, who replaces the injured Miku Kanae, and VENY’s longtime friend and tag partner, Yuki Kamifuku, who is set to retire from in ring action on December 26.

The second match will feature an all-men’s three-way contest as SSPW’s Hayato Mashita, freelancer Ikuto Hidaka, and ZERO1’s Takuya Sugawara will team to battle Up Town’s young upstart Hyo Ogawa, JYO’s Naoya Akama, and the reigning KO-D Openweight Champion, DDT’s MAO.

Following that, there will be a trios match pitting the imposing Chanyota, Marvelous’ nefarious Maria, and STARDOM’s most recent 5STAR Grand Prix winner, Rina against Makota, Nagisa Nozaki, and Joshi legend, Mima Shimoda.

More Joshi legends will be in action in the fourth match of the evening as youngsters Selene Misora and YUNA will take on the former two-time WWWA World Champion and 49 year pro, Jaguar Yokota, and three-time WWWA World Champion and 40-year pro, Yumika Hotta.

The fifth match of the show will feature even more massive names in Joshi as Hiyoto Matsumoto and Rina Yamashita will team up with one of the front runners of wrestler of the year, Chihiro Hashimoto, and perhaps the greatest women’s wrestler of all time, Aja Kong.

Finally, the main event will see VENY herself battle the great Ayako Hamada, who hasn’t wrestled a match in Japan since she took part in a trios match on a WAVE show on May 6, 2018.

Hamada has had a long and storied career inside the squared circle. She is the daughter of the legendary Gran Hamada, a man who was one of the first in Japan to mix Lucha Libre with the Japanese wrestling style back in the 1980s and 90s. Without him, we perhaps don’t see the junior heavyweight wrestling boom of the 1990s that sparked the creation of Michinoku Pro Wrestling and Toryumon, the precursor of Dragongate.

Born in Mexico City, where Gran Hamada worked during much of his career, Ayako Hamada spent much of her early years wrestling in Japan, mostly for Arsion, Aja Kong’s company, GAEA Japan, and even worked during the final years of All Japan Women’s Wrestling. In 2007, during the beginning of a dark age of Joshi, Hamada split her time between the east and west before settling with TNA, where she would win the Knockouts Tag Titles on two occasions.

During the 2010s, Hamada would spend most of her time back in Japan, working for newer Joshi promotions including Ice Ribbon, SEAdLINNNG, Sendai Girls, Diana, OZ Academy, and most notably WAVE, however in May of 2018, she would leave WAVE outright after she was charged with possession of methamphetamine, a charge that carried a suspended sentence. She announced her retirement, however she would return to the ring in 2019 in her native Mexico. According to Cagematch, she has wrestled in 113 matches since her return in July of 2019.

Her return to wrestling in Japan is a massive event as she is one of the missing links between the dark period of Joshi from the 2000s and this modern renaissance that the scene has been experiencing this decade. Her match with someone as magnetic and crucial to the Joshi scene today in VENY is in all intents and purposes a true blue dream match.

Bloom will be viewable from a special streaming site for 4000 Yen, which is $25.27 or £19.16.

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As always, we’ll aim to provide any further updates on VENY’s “Bloom” show as soon as we hear more.