Ichinojo will join Hakuho on the couch for the upcoming fall tournament. Minato oyakata cited lower back pain as the reason he needed to withdraw. After a high-flying first few tournaments, it became apparent over the last few basho that the nagging back injury was hindering his progress.
Regular readers of this blog are probably very familiar with my position that injured wrestlers should sit – demotion be damned. In Ichinojo’s case, however, his Maegashira 3 rank is certainly high enough for him to not need to worry about demotion from makuuchi and likely made the decision easier. As noted in this 中日スポーツ article, the more intense competition from the higher ranked wrestlers made it necessary for Ichinojo to rest this tournament.
As Bruce has also noted, Hakuho will not compete due to injury, as well.
Well, that did not take long – Andy are you aware of anyone else who is kind of banged up and maybe not quite ready to go at it Sunday? I started trying to read through all of the stuff from the Jungyo, but that all seems to be up beat “happy days” stuff.
Harumafuji was on NHK world tonight, pretty good piece on him, showed him painting too! But I doubt he will consider resting them up. I would imagine he wants a rematch with a few folks he had trouble with in Nagoya.
Do you think Gagamaru is all patched up? That much mass on a human body is a mechanical injury tying to happen….
Thanks for posting this.
Also of note, there is a brief write-up on cibersumo.com on Ichinojo’s injury and kyujo – http://www.cibersumo.com/index.php/en/sumo/press-room-news/987-ichinojo-out-of-autumn-tourney-with-back-pain
It’s funny how WordPress will let you put links in articles but I still have to approve if you put a link in the comments.