Asuka Saito: Her mandatory monthly post for.... March?!?!

 

 If you've read any of the Idol posts the past month you know how down I was with Nogi or to be more specific their management. Don't want to discuss the scandal which took place over a month ago but hopefully we'll never see that new member again. So had stopped doing Nogi posts for over a month but there still are some members who I do like quite a bit and after doing posts for them for so many years did I want to stop doing them? The answer is no and these days the more popular members actually do more activities outside of Nogi than within the group. Asuka is one such member and I've really come to like her so much over the years, getting older has helped as she'll be turning 24 in August. On her 23rd birthday said I would try to have a monthly post for Asuka which did happen until February. But because of the scandal didn't do any posts for them until a week ago.

 This post could have been done two weeks ago as most of the pics will be new ones that came out between February 26th and March 15th. So will consider this to be a March post to keep that streak alive, am holding back about twenty pics so there will be another Asuka post this month for her fans. Hate to say but she's never been one of the more popular Nogi members I post about, these posts do get many views compared to others but not at the level of other Nogi members. That scandal paid off a bit for Asuka as she became the co-center of the new song "Actually' and it's been too long since she had a solo center. But the damage had been done by the ineptness of Nogi's management as single #29 just sold 463,000+ copies in it's first week out. Of course it topped the charts and while most groups would kill to sell that amount of singles it was Nogi's lowest first week sales since 2015!!!! Yes, that scandal had an affect on sales but to me it's also been the case of too many popular members leaving the last few years, it's not the Nogi me and so many others had followed for over seven years.

 Asuka is just one of four first generation members remaining, there's only two left from the second generation so the group these days is 95% different than it was back in 2015. Don't think Asuka will be the next member to leave and really hope she doesn't depart for a few years but we all know it'll be happening but at least she's popular enough to have a successful solo career. Few recent Instagram pics from her but she's always been the worst member as far as posting pics go.

 Asuka was at the March 21st 'Tokyo Girls Collection' show but am going to hold on to those pics for her next post, that should be in about two weeks. Am also going to hold back some newish 'Nogi Fes' cards for that post but do have many new superb ones here. At first wasn't going to hold any pics back but needed to make amends for March so this post will be much smaller than planned.

 This batch here are from a recent TV Bros. interview with Asuka talking about her variety show and some upcoming April activities, here's the link to it: TV Bros. interview

 On March 4th Asuka, along with Nogi's team captain, was at an event for Baitoru. That's an employment company in Japan and over the years Nogi has done too many videos for them to count. The event was to promote some sort of 'Team Campaign' for the company's part time workers and bet very few Nogi members have ever had any kind of regular job. As you can see the pair were dressed in Baseball uniforms as the season over in Japan should be starting any day now. It's rare when there's a video for a Nogi event but here's one and there are more on YT: Baitoru event

 To end things off have this terrific spread from the April 6th issue of Weekly Shonen which did come out ten days ago. Asuka is the cover girl as she is for most magazines she appears in but what a decrease in spreads for her the last year, same goes for many other Nogi members too. No decent new videos but have an interesting one after the pics which was uploaded recently. It's a behind the scenes video from the "Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken" film and I really enjoyed that movie and drama, she hasn't appeared in any shows since then.