Friday, January 10, 2014

Saori Ishioka to return for Mika Nagano retirement match

Mika Nagano, Saori Ishioka
DEEP JEWELS announced yesterday that Saori Ishioka will return to MMA to face Mika Nagano in her retirement match on the Feb. 16 Shinjuku FACE show. This will be an exhibition match. It's not a real match. Ishioka is returning to DEEP JEWELS after getting married in July 2012 and then having a child. DEEP JEWELS matchmaker Shigeru Saeki tried to set up Ishioka for stardom when JEWELS first started in 2008. She's young, attractive, the dirty old men like her. But her record is 12-7 and she has never beaten a top tier fighter. Ishioka is a teammate of Shizuka Sugiyama at Zendokai and both train with veteran Misaki Takimoto. All three fighters are primarily karate girls and none of them are strong on the ground. Ishioka's last fight was a win over WINDY Tomomi on Mar. 11, 2012 PANCRASE show. That was WINDY's retirement match. Before that she lost to Yuka Tsuji and Ham Seo Hee. After her 2010 loss to Sakura Nomura, Ishioka considered retirement but did return. I'm sure she will have her first real match on the next DEEP JEWELS show. We'll see how she adapts to some of the rule changes. She can be a DEEP JEWELS Lightweight Championship contender if she puts a few wins together.

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