Tiger Jeet Singh has defended his actions at Megumi Kudo’s anniversary card over the weekend, where a fan was injured during his entrance.
Singh, 82, was accompanied to the ring at Yoyogi National Gymnasium on Saturday, with son Tiger Jeet Singh Jr. (Tiger Ali Singh in WWF) and his grandson, Sarjen, for the Zero1 card.
Singh was a special guest before a tag match involving Masakatsu Funaki & Tatsumi Fujinami against Shiro Koshinaka & Mitsuya Nagai. He came out to his popular song, “Saber Tiger”, brandishing his sword and directing the weapon at fans. One fan ended up being cut by the sword, requiring medical attention and treated for what were described as minor injuries by Tokyo Sports.
Kudo apologized at the post-match press conference, and while Singh Jr. stated his father struck him by accident, the elder Singh did not apologize when speaking with reporters. “It was a mistake for him to be in front of me. He’s at fault. You know that, he just had to run away from me”.
It was Singh’s first trip to Japan since 2012, and he is a legendary figure in Japanese wrestling history. Singh had a major feud with Antonio Inoki, which featured a famous scene where Singh attacked Inoki at a shopping center in 1972.
Singh is a candidate on the ballot for this year’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter Hall of Fame, with Jonathan Snowden recently arguing the case for Singh’s induction.
