Wednesday 20 April 2016

Ipswich v Fulham Review: Looking Forward

I genuinely can't think of a better game to sum Fulham up than the one we've had tonight. I'll preface what I'm about to say by saying that we are too, but Ipswich were just so bad tonight. This is the 4th time we've played Ipswich since we've come down (and probably the longest gap between Away Games at a team ever), and this was by far and a way the worst I've seen them play against us. Obviously I can't comment on Ipswich because I haven't seen them every week, but tonight it got to the point where Ipswich were ironically cheering their first Shot on Target. Of course, because we're Fulham- we just couldn't put them away with all of the chances we created and then Knudsen popped up with a late equaliser for the Draw.

I suppose if we're looking at positives to take from today, and there definitely are some which I'll try to highlight as this Review progresses. Unless we decide to make a habit of repeating Friday Night's result, we're safe now. My whole thing over the last 3 or so Months has been I don't care how we stay up, as long as we actually do. Unlike last year, where I didn't have any faith in Kit when it came to giving him a whole Summer to make "his" squad and improve the team to the point of a Playoff push. Simply put, I believe that Jokanovic is the right man to take us forward- and after a whole Summer under Slavisa with some (hopefully) good and ambitious signings as well as clearing all of the deadweight from the squad we'll be much better off at the start of August.

On the subject of deadweight, in reference to the Team Selection and the number of changes we made today- I really don't get what some peoples complaints were. We'd just lot 5-0 on Friday, and especially 2nd Half just completely bottled it- why shouldn't Jokanovic have made multiple changes? It's great to see that Jokanovic isn't afraid to make multiple changes after a bad performance. I'm not a Dan Burn fan, I know I've been relatively neutral on the subject this season so you may not be aware. But changing the Centre-Back pairing that shipped 5, isn't a bad thing. Especially with Madl out, I don't see what was wrong with Slavisa taking a look at Hutchinson either- because it's his job to determine who he wants to retain for next season.

Right then, onto the goals. I won't comment on the night Dembele had at the Football League Awards, because it's literally impossible for me to not be biased. However, he's popped up with another goal- and it was a really good one tonight. As Parker broke into the box, I was begging for him to just cut it back to McCormack- so full credit to Parker for having the vision to put the ball across the box- as well as to Dembele for getting enough power on the shot to beat Bialkowski. Enter the danger zone for Fulham, also known as the last 10 Minutes of a Football game. It wasn't exactly identical to our goal, but Knudsen's late equaliser was close enough, in that it's another ball across the box and a powered shot that just couldn't be kept out. It's annoying without a doubt, but I would have taken a Draw going in- and I'll stick to that now.

Bettinelli hardly had anything to do for probably about 65 Minutes, but as Ipswich grew into the game once we scored he did well when required to. Obviously it's another game without a Clean Sheet for Bettinelli, and this one especially must be annoying for him- but there's not much he could have done for the Goal and we just have to hope Bettinelli gets at the very least a competent defence in-front of him for next season.

Speaking of the Defence, we'd made 2 changes to it from the Brighton game with Burn and Hutchinson coming in- as well as a positional change with Stearman going back to Right-Back. You can definitely say we looked more solid than we did against Brighton, but that's not exactly a high bar to surpass. In these next three games I'm expecting another few defensive changes, because Jokanovic has to work out who he wants to keep on- with Defence being the obvious area that needs to be completely turned over. In my opinion the priority in Defence should be finding a proper partner for Madl, the Hangeland to his Hughes if you will. We need that for the spine of the team, because you'll see in all of the successful teams with the exception of Boro they've had a settled Centre-Back pairing.

It wasn't exactly the most testing of games for our Defence today, but on the whole I do feel like they've played well(ish) for the most part. If there's one thing to say about Hutchinson; while it's obviously not his job to score- I've got no idea how he hasn't scored 1, if not 2 Goals today. We've been lacking a proper aerial threat at Set-Pieces all season, so while we didn't score from one today- that was a positive I suppose. Hutchinson's in with a decent shout of MOTM tonight, and it's a shame we didn't get a Clean Sheet to mark his return to the team. Fair-play to Dan Burn, he's come in and done a decent job today. I still wouldn't renew his Contract in the Summer though, we need to completely reboot of our Defence in the Summer- and to me, Dan Burn who simply isn't good enough to be playing at the level we wish to play at next season should be one of the ones to go.

Ream was decent tonight, I can't see Tim Ream being around as anything more than a bit-part player next season, and if I had to guess I could see him going back to the MLS this Summer. I'm sure there'd be some takers for him, and we could probably get a decent(ish) fee for him. I'm not sure what the future is for Richard Stearman, who's had an alright game tonight. He's come here expecting the be one of the first names on the Team Sheet of a team pushing for Playoffs- and he's ended up being in and out of the team in a Relegation Battle. It all depends on how much Jokanovic rates him I suppose, and if he wants to stay when he's not guaranteed to be a starter. I do see value in him for next season, I suppose it's just a "wait and see" type scenario.

It's not a coincidence we've conceded 5 in 5 since Rohan Ince has came back in the team, and the one game he's had to miss we've shipped 5 in that one game. In short, and it's a point I've made for pretty much my entire time doing these Reviews- we need a proper DM to protect the Back Four. If it meant we could sign Ince permanently, I'd be all for Brighton going up this season, because I really, really rate him. He's turned into a key part of the team, after not even being a part of it for the first 2 or so Months of his Loan Spell. Whether it's Rohan Ince or someone like him, we need to be signing a Holding-Mid this Summer. I thought Ince did well today, he's never going to be a remarkable player in the sense of Goals/Assists and general "flair"- but he knows his role and he does it well.

Christensen didn't exactly hit the heights we know he's capable of tonight, but I did think in comparison to the majority of his performances this season he did pretty well tonight. He looked like making something happen quite a lot tonight- albeit against a fairly tepid Ipswich Midfield and Defence. I thought Tunnicliffe did well enough today, it's kind of hard to judge our Midfield in this game- because Ipswich didn't really offer much and pretty much just let us play our game without too much pressure up until Dembele's Goal.

Parker's turned in another good performance tonight, and I don't think it's a coincidence that we conceded once Parker took his leave tonight. Parker's arguably our most important player at the moment. Taking Parker off on Friday after Brighton's 3rd was Slavisa waving the White Flag, and the players followed suit. Tonight, we obviously didn't completely bottle it- but Parker's such an important character to have on the pitch. I suppose if Parker was younger he wouldn't be at Fulham, but hypothetically if Parker was younger and able to play 46 Games a Season there wouldn't even be a question about renewing his Contract whatever the Cost for next season.

I'll be interested to see what's said about McCormack in Jokanovic's Pre-Match Press Conference on Friday, because he didn't look completely comfortable when he was taken off- which was presumably the reason he was taken off in the first place. It wasn't McCormack's best game of course, but he's still done well I felt for the most part tonight.

Dembele's obviously gotten another Goal, and he's had a reasonably good game tonight. The obvious elephant in the room with Dembele is simply where he's going to end up playing next season. I've still got a very small hope that we can convince Dembele to sign a new Contract.

To give an example, I'll use Demarai Gray's new contract at Birmingham that they gave him last summer. Birmingham got to hold onto Gray for a little while longer, Gray got (presumably) a lot more than he was previously making- and both sides reaped the benefits of Gray playing regular Football which I doubt Dembele could get yet at the majority of Top Level Clubs just because of how raw he still is. Included in that was obviously a Release Clause that was probably below what Gray was worth (which Leicester of course activated in January). Even if we did just keep Dembele until January and then got say 4-5 Million for him- that's better than waiting over a Year for a Tribunal to decide the fee or getting a nominal fee if he moves abroad.

It was good to see Tom Cairney back in the team tonight after his injury, and he's going to be a key player for us next season. I'm going to go into a lot more depth in one of my Post-Season Blogs- most likely the one where I turn Scout and suggest players we could sign- but suffice to say I believe Tom Cairney's a player we can hang our hats on. Baird's come on for Parker late on, and didn't really get a chance to do much. I'm going to be interested to see how Ryan Fredericks fits into the team/squad next season, because I do believe he will have a role to play. He didn't really do much tonight, but if he can stay fit next season he'll be a good player for us.

It's always gutting when you concede a last minute Equaliser/Winner, and especially with how many we've conceded this season (and over the last 3-4 Years) it just gets ridiculous. With that said, I would have taken a Draw coming into the game- and the Draw tonight also means we've only lost 1 of the 5 Games we've had Post-International Break which was Jokanovic's first real chance to just work with the team on the Training Ground Non-Stop. In short, it's not all Doom and Gloom. We can pretty much look toward the Summer and Next Season now with tonight's result and MK Dons not beating Sheffield Wednesday, but we're not done yet and the Reviews are back again on Saturday for the Forest Review where hopefully we can get a Win before we go to Brentford.

Thanks for reading as always, as was the case last season- I'll be doing some Posts once the Season's over along the lines of Signings and all that stuff which we're hopefully already planning and putting those plans into action. Just off the top of my head, with Charlton being Relegation today- I'd be getting Johann Berg Gudmundsson's Agent on the Phone and putting a bid in for him at the earliest possible opportunity (I'm not sure if we had the Transfer Embargo for a Window, or a Date-Date type thing). Thanks again for reading, as always I hope you've enjoyed the Review. Season Tickets will be tomorrow morning, so keep an eye out.

Tuesday 19 April 2016

RAW Review: 18th April

That's right, it's this time again already. It's not exactly a secret that Post-Wrestlemania, the on-air product has improved massively- and the latest effort was of course coming from the O2 in London. I HATE Pre-Taped RAW's most of the time, just because there's not really a sense of jeopardy involved when the RAW's already happened. I did consider watching that Stream for RAW live that was being hosted on that Russian Website to counter-balance it, but I just decided to watch it at 1-4am like usual. Rather than avoid Spoilers, which is impossible for me- just because of how I am. I instead decided to embrace the Spoilers, and use them to try and get excited for what I was actually going to watch. There was definitely some things that looked good on paper, so let's see how it all came off.

The Ambrose Asylum w/ Every Upper-Midcarder & Shane McMahon
I was at the forefront of the Potted Plant jokes last week, so I'd like to take the credit for without a doubt the best bit of this segment- which was of course them protecting the new Potted Plant at all costs. I started off liking this segment, we of course had Dean Ambrose playing the role of Dolph Ziggler. Then Shane came out, then Owens came out, then Zayn came out, then Jericho came out, then D'lo Brown came out. I may have made that last one up, in short- this turned into a bit of a clusterfuck. The end-game was good, and this segment was far from bad- but it was just too much in my opinion. Just because it's not an Authority Promo opening the show, it doesn't mean that Opening Segments are now immune from criticism.

A I said the end-game of the segment was good though, in that they announced the two "main matches" of the night- which are seemingly becoming a fixture in the Post-Mania WWE. We also of course got the two Payback Matches announced in Zayn/Owens & Jericho/Ambrose, which everyone saw coming. I just wish it hadn't have all come in this segment. But the Potted Plant was safe, and that's all that really matters.

Chris Jericho v Sami Zayn
I absolutely love Jericho at the moment. His character's just so self-aware, and Jericho's highlighted all of the less desirable aspects of both his character, and upped the "Antagonising Smarks" levels of his character- and it's just perfect. I can almost forgive them for beating AJ at Mania, because we've gotten this character amped up to 11 as a result. Yes, we had another "burial" of young talent here by Jericho when he beat Sami Zayn. The match was good without being great. I think a common theme of the two "main" matches on RAW's- assuming that' the direction they're going in now will be me saying giving who's involved it's impossible for it to be a bad match. Which is of course the case here. This was about as good as it could have been in my opinion, barring giving these two a long feud and a long PPV match.

AJ Styles, Luke Gallows & Karl Anderson reunion
I'm surprised they went so far in on the whole "former lives" aspect of these three- especially right off the bat. If you read my RAW Review last week, you'll know I was predicting a tease of these three aligning at Payback before Gallows and Anderson attacked Styles and it was revealed that Roman was the "3rd Man". That was all I was expecting, a tease. However, I'm definitely not complaining about this segment- because it was just fucking cool to see it.

Enzo & Big Cass v The Dudleys
The weakest part of Enzo & Big Cass has always been their ringwork, without a shadow of a doubt. I know not everyone watches NXT, but we've now had 3 weeks of Enzo's Promos on the Main Roster- so it's not even worth saying that Enzo's money on the mic any more. What was far more remarkable was the match that took place.

This was probably Enzo & Cass' best match, including NXT. I've given The Dudleys, and specifically Bubba a lot of stick since their return- but one thing I don't question is that they're amazing Heels. This goes back to my point about Roman that I've been making, a Heel's job is to make sure that whoever they're up against is the most over Babyface on the show. The Dudleys are masters of this, and they played their roles last night to absolute perfection.

I'm not sure why I mentally paired Enzo & Cass with The Dudleys when I was thinking about call-ups around Mania, but now I know. They're exactly what they need coming onto the Main Roster. While the NXT Tag Teams are great, they're pretty much all exclusively "WWE bred" talents. Pairing them with The Dudleys gives Enzo & Cass a new proposition in-terms of styles- and they can learn from veterans along the way.

Roman Reigns, AJ Styles, Gallows & Anderson Segment
I realise this joke's been massively over-used, but the Promo that Roman's doing now isn't a good promo, it isn't a bad promo- it's THE promo that he's gonna be doing for a while. That's not necessarily a bad thing, especially if Roman does turn Heel (officially) he can pause after the "I'm not a Bad Guy" bit and say "You know what, I am a Bad Guy". Also, if you're hating that line- good. Because, Roman is a Heel.

I think, in my mind at least the only "swerve" that can take place at Payback in the Main Event would be if Gallows and Anderson just aligned with AJ. I'm not sure if Gallows and Anderson attacking Roman has strengthened or weakened my theory on Roman being the "3rd Man" to be honest. Yes, they did attack him. But, it wasn't exactly a vicious beating. It was literally one move, and Roman was up walking and talking in the next segment. It's the ol' misdirection routine, my dear Watson.

The obvious direction is of course Finn being the "Puppet Master" in this game. My thing with that though, if it is- I've got no idea how they book Payback. After losing at Mania, Styles needs to be protected at Payback. The obvious way to do this, is to have Gallows and Anderson attack him- because he's not getting the Title. Unless they want to make Roman's gimmick that he's fortunate to be winning- but he's not smart enough to engineer the cheap wins himself- I can't see how Gallows and Anderson get involved without doing Roman a favour. Which just doesn't make sense to me, unless Balor doesn't see Roman as more of a threat than Styles- in which case he's stupid.

All that aside, if Balor is revealed as the Puppet Master. AJ would presumably move on, hopefully to Kevin Owens or maybe even bring Samoa Joe up. AJ/Balor is of course a possibility given how AJ entered the Bullet Club though. The two matches that I could see happening, are of course Finn/Roman and Balor Club/Shield. My worry with Balor, if the angle is him going after Roman- is that they'd better be ready to give him the Title if they pull the trigger on that feud. The Balor Club CAN'T lose any time soon. If it were up to me, the Balor Club wouldn't lose until Wrestlemania. If they build up to Roman/Finn, presumably at Summerslam- and Roman wins. We'll just have another Nexus, but with Roman in Cena's spot 6 Years on from the same show.

With all of that said, the point I've tried to make is there's not going to be a perfect outcome at Payback. There's going to be plot-holes, so now I've written all of that I'm just going to sit back and enjoy what we get given.

Baron Corbin v Fandango
I wonder what the Odds would have been on me genuinely wanting Corbin to beat Ziggler at a PPV when Corbin was feuding with Bull Dempsey and just generally not that good. But, that's where we are now. Corbin's just a complete star, and if they just keep building him up and don't fuck with him or his gimmick- he's going to be in and around the Main Event scene within the next year or two. The match wasn't much, the attack on Ziggler looked great- and Corbin's exchange with the Fan who told him he sucked was just amazing. I said in my End of Year Awards for 2015, that I was heading into 2016 as a massive Baron Corbin fan- and I've only grown more fond of him over the last 4 and a Half Months.

Also just a small aside, because of that Russian Stream of the whole uninterrupted show people have taken Fandango's Entrance from it. HE HAD "LET'S GET WEIRD" ON HIS JACKET! MAYBE THERE'S HOPE FOR HIM CHLOROFORMING BYRON YET!

MizTV w/ Cesaro
Miz and Maryse are just great. I said it last week, and it's worth repeating. Miz is the one true Heel left in the WWE. Everything about him is done in a way that makes people want to boo him. Maryse is just the perfect addition to the act, and it all just works. I know people were pissed that Zack lost the Title so quickly, but Miz without a doubt deserved his IC Title run with his work prior to Mania- and now he's got it he's not slowed down one bit. The one thing I want Miz to do now, after his "multiple take" Promos- is to now require multiple takes to do moves. Miz goes for the Skull Crushing Finale, Cesaro powers out of it, Maryse storms the ring shouting "Cut" and "Do it again", Cesaro's distracted, Miz takes advantage, hits him with the Skull Crushing Finale and wins.

Also, quick point. If anyone in charge is reading this. PLEASE, stop using the Royal Family to try and get heat. Nobody in England gives a fuck about them. How do you get heat in England? I'm assuming the next pair of UK Shows will be in Manchester, right? Have someone come out in a Liverpool Shirt and sing "You'll Never Walk Alone". As I'm writing this, Bubba Ray has tweeted a picture of himself in a Liverpool Shirt with the Hashtag #YNWA from when he did it at Impact. Remember what I said earlier about them just "getting" being a Heel.

Cesaro's doing really well with this new character he's been given. I love Cesaro, but I do have a feeling its one that I'll get bored of fairly quickly though. I'll never be bored of Cesaro in the ring, but the character isn't great in my opinion. Obviously AJ had an in-ring talk segment last night, but on the whole they've done their best to hide his weakness-that is of course Promos. They need to do the same with Cesaro and have him become almost exclusively "just" a Wrestler- and let the Bond Entrance, Sunglasses etc. as well as his mannerisms get the character over. The whole tearing off the Suit to reveal the Booty O's T-Shirt thing was good though- and the reaction to New Day and Big E's whole "OOOOOOOHHHHHHH LONDON etc." was probably the loudest I've ever heard.

Cesaro & New Day v The Miz & The League of Nations
This match was really fun. I was reminded of the really fun New Day/KiddSaro matches we had around this time last year as a result of Cesaro teaming with New Day, and this match was just pretty good all things considered. I doubt it was what they intended to book when everyone left to go on the tour, but they did a decent job of getting everyone involved in these two segments.

Speaking of this match not being what they intended to, I feel like this is the right section to talk about Bray Wyatt getting injured. It's fucking annoying, and I can't imagine how Bray must have felt when it happened after the RAW he had last week. There's not much to actually say, I suppose. Summerslam's enough of a distance away that I doubt he's a doubt for it- so he just has to do Promos from his Rocking Chair in the meantime.

Natalya, Paige, Becky Lynch & Sasha Banks v Charlotte, Summer Rae, Naomi & Tamina
This match wasn't much, although I did find it funny that aside from Naomi, Summer and Tamina- Paige was the person who got the least reaction last night. She's young enough to the point where it's not an un-fixable issue, but they've massively fucked her up. Natalya made Charlotte tap, which was good in a way to just try and legitimise Nattie as a contender to Charlotte. If the last 8 Years of bad booking hadn't have happened they may have even succeeded. I suppose the big thing from this stuff last night was the announcement that Bret's in Nattie's corner at Payback. Which is obviously good after his fight with Cancer recently, and it obviously reminds me of the NXT match these two had with Bret and Flair in their respective corners. Which was absolutely hilarious, because Flair sold everything like he was going to die if Charlotte didn't get the win- and Bret just looked like he didn't really give a fuck.

The Vaudevillains v The Usos
After the attack on them last week, I think it was pretty clear that The Usos weren't going to be winning the Tournament- and of course with Enzo & Cass feuding with The Dudleys that The Vaudevillains would. I'm perfectly fine with that, because they need to work on building Enzo & Cass (and Gallows and Anderson)- and The Vaudevillains are more than solid place-holders for them.

The match was fine, they're both capable of more- but with The Usos selling the attack on them last week, the crowd being worn out, and the match not getting that much time it was about as good as it could have been in my opinion.

Apollo Crews v Heath Slater
The match was just a fairly standard squash, but the good thing about this segment was just how much they were putting Crews over on Commentary. They were using phrases like "mega-star" and "future champion" in relation to Crews. That can only be a good thing in-terms of his future prospects.

Dean Ambrose v Kevin Owens
If this RAW was condensed into 2 Hours, shifting one of the Tag Title Semi-Finals over to Smackdown, cutting the time down massively on the Womens Tag, and taking a few minutes off some of the matches- it would have been great. As it was, everyone was just worn out by the time this match came on- including me. Everything that Owens and Ambrose did was good, and going back to my point with Zayn and Jericho- it's impossible for these two to have a bad match with each other. I just couldn't really get into it, with how long everything felt up to this point. The Jericho attack was good, and I did love the fact Jericho kept his Scarf on when he was attacking Ambrose to end.

Last Night started off great, and it just slowly declined as the show went on. Pretty much from the whole Gallows and Anderson attack on Reigns, everything just slowly felt more dragged out- to the point where we had complete disinterest in a Main Event of Dean Ambrose and Kevin Owens. This was basically because they packed everyone worth watching into the first half of the show. We had Zayn, Jericho, Shane, Owens and Ambrose all in the first segment- using up their "main" pop. Enzo & Cass should have swapped with The Usos match in my opinion, New Day were in the 2nd Hour, Cesaro was in the 2nd Hour- and the last Hour was an 8-Women Tag, The Usos/Vaudevillains, another Apollo Crews squash and then a Main Event of two guys we'd already seen. You don't need to be a genius to work out the trajectory at which the show went.

Thanks for reading as always, we're I believe 2 Weeks away from Payback which is likely to be judgement day in regard to the whole Gallows and Anderson angle and where they go- so that should be fun. In the meantime, I hope you have a good week and will be back here for the RAW Review next week. Thanks again for reading, and with the movement getting some traction on RAW last night- I'll just remind all of you. #PlantLivesMatter.

Tuesday 12 April 2016

RAW Review: 11th April

Right then, it's another RAW Review- and just over a week removed from Wrestlemania and absolutely nothing from Wrestlemania matters. Literally, the only thing that happened at Wrestlemania that's been properly followed up on is Baron Corbin's debut. However, that's not really a bad thing.

I can't remember if I said this in my Mania Review or my RAW Review from last week, but the beauty of Wrestling is that it's truly a never ending story- there's never a proper last chapter in the book so to speak. Yes, Wrestlemania was ridiculously underwhelming and most of its finishes were fucked- had that been the "Season Finale" of the WWE fair enough. But, it wasn't and the WWE always had time to get it "right" again coming off the back of Mania. Enter last night's RAW. There's no such thing as a perfect Three-Hour RAW. Especially when you factor in probably 80% of the crowd being in for Superstars as well, it's just impossible for a Crowd to stay at its hottest for the entirety of RAW- and to be blunt WWE just can't book one. There's always a "lull", or a segment that's just plain annoying- however last night came pretty fucking close to achieving perfection.

Shane McMahon, Kevin Owens Opening Segment
This was such a great Opening Segment, in the sense that it felt relatively fresh. Not having a Heel open the show, and basically bury the crowd and everyone watching just sort of seemed to start the show off on a more "upbeat" note. Shane managed to put together the entire card in about 5 Minutes, when The Authority would have taken 25- and then out came Kevin Owens. Again, going back to fresh- I know Owens had the interactions with Stephanie when they set-up the IC Title Ladder Match. However, I wouldn't say Owens has had enough interactions with the "Authority Figures" recently to say that this wasn't a really good idea. Having different people interact with Shane, open the show etc. will only ever elevate said guy- whether it's Cesaro, Kevin Owens, Miz and pretty much everyone else. I'm not sure why Owens had to "earn" his mandatory Rematch Clause, but I suppose the only other way we can judge if they're still a thing in "Shane's WWE" is to look at the only other Title that changed hands- and Triple H has yet to claim his either.

Cesaro v Kevin Owens- IC Title #1 Contender Match
This was just simply a really fucking good match. It's just so great to finally have Cesaro back, and everything points to them finally treating him like the complete star that he is. I love them having the Bond Gun Barrel thing for his Entrance now. They've managed a sort of hybrid of making Cesaro; Bond, Superman and the Transporter with his Entrance- and I just absolutely love it.

I've probably said this a ridiculous number of times when these two had their series of matches around Summerslam last year, it's literally impossible for these two to have a bad match with each other. I don't think the crowd knew quite how to react to the match in all honesty, with the focus being on Owens working Cesaro's Shoulder and the whole match being almost exclusively based on that. I'm not sure about the finish to be honest, obviously Cesaro needed to win- but Owens losing clean combined the finish of Sami's match just caught be a bit off guard. I was fully expecting shenanigans, especially in this match after what happened with Sami and Owens last week.

Dr. Phil meets Charlotte and Ric Flair
I only know this bloke from references to him on TV Shows I watch, and I genuinely thought his thing was that he wore a mask with how much Plastic Surgery he's had. This was just a weird segment, I understand the train of thought of having the Dr. Phil involved with the Womens Championship being a bad thing, but with what happened- and more specifically said by Dr. Phil later I understand why the did it.

The Dudleys v The Lucha Dragons
The New Day Promo just prior was New Day's usual stuff, and it was just a means to an end- and was largely treated as such.

This match was just so weird to me. They went to an Ad Break, and then by the time they came back Kalisto was dead- or at the very least in the process of dying and it was a 2-on-1 match. If I had to take a guess, Kalisto's next feud will in fact be Sin Cara- but with how much they've fucked the US Title up since Cena dropped it there's really nothing certain about it.

Enzo & Cass coming out after confirmed a couple of things; Enzo Amore has money written all over him, and Enzo & Cass aren't winning the Tag Tournament. I worked it out on Twitter last night, going by the brackets- and assuming The Usos aren't somehow written off after last night's attack it's The Usos who'll be winning.

By Bracket;
The Usos (Confirmed)
The Vaudevillains
Enzo & Cass
The Dudleys (Confirmed)

The Usos (although, there's a chance we get interference & the Vaudevillains win now)
Enzo & Cass (most likely with a roll-up)

The Usos/Vaudevillains w/ Dudleys interference.

I'd also like to say how happy I am to see a Tournament in Wrestling again. I know we had the WWE Title one out of necessity, but I've always felt Tournaments were such a great part of wrestling. Both in the spectacle sense, and also because it gives a spotlight to 8 in this case Tag-Teams while also maintaining the big spotlight on the current Champions. Without knowing for definite, I'd assume New Day are going to be taking it easy for a few weeks- which isn't necessarily a bad thing and can give a tiny bit of a rest in-terms of their act with the Fans which should serve them in good stead.

Roman Reigns, The Wyatts, The League of Nations Segment
I actually quite liked this segment. I genuinely hold the opinion that the WWE now give Roman three scripts per Episode and one is deployed depending on how the crowd reacts to him. 1 for a Heel, 1 for a Babyface and 1 for a Tweener. Last Week was most definitely the Heel script, and this one was more a Tweener. I still maintain that Roman's a Heel, as I said last week putting anyone up against him makes said person the most over Babyface in the Company. How that doesn't mean Roman's considered a Heel is beyond me. The stuff with the League of Nations was an interesting direction, in the sense that they kept AJ and Roman completely separate and focused on building both guys up tonight- which is smart in my book.

As soon as the League came out, I'm sure we all knew The Wyatts wouldn't be far behind. What did surprised me was the match made off the back of said Wyatts not being far behind. It was just complete "Holla Holla" booking, but I was fine with it- because Roman and Bray are always going to be opposing each other for the duration of their most likely lengthy WWE Careers. Anyone but you, Roman.

Epico & Primo Vignette
I make a point of giving literally every gimmick on WWE TV a try before I start burying it. So, with that in mind I won't start burying this gimmick yet. But, WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK IS THIS GIMMICK GOING TO ENTAIL?! Are we going to get Epico & Primo refusing to wrestle in the ring, and insist all of their opponents wrestle in Puerto Rico or what?

Natalya v Charlotte- Women's Title
I'll start with how this ended, and more specifically the Dr. Phil stuff. In the WWE's minds, Dr. Phil will attract more viewers. I think that's safe to say- otherwise he wouldn't have been booked to appear on RAW. So, in the WWE's mind- he's bringing in all these extra viewers so they decide he's best used to put over how great the Women's Division is. I'm not saying it'll be successful, and I've got no idea how much "pulling power" Dr. Phil has in America- but from someone completely cold to him that's why they did it.

My problem with this match, and basically the feud is there's no jeopardy involved. Nobody actually believes that Natalya's getting the Divas Title. With that said, I think it's a testament to just how good the match was that the crowd were as into the False Finishes as they were toward the end of the match. These two are two of the better Wrestlers in the Women's Division without a doubt, it's just a shame Nattie's been fucked up beyond repair in my opinion.

I could be wrong, but the constant Flair interference says to me that they're angling for a Cage Match between Charlotte and Nattie. That would be a massive step in the right direction for this new Women's Division and I'm assuming that's why the WWE have put a "trusted veteran" like Nattie in the position for said Cage match.

AJ Styles & Sami Zayn Backstage Promo
I liked this, it was the sort of friendly, competitive rivalry type thing that I wish we'd get more of in the WWE.

The Usos v The Social Outcasts
Let's be honest, nobody cares about that- The Usos won.

Karl Anderson & Doc/Luke Gallows join the Social Outcasts
I mean, that's what happened right? This moment was one of the times that you just know was special, and is going to lead to something absolutely massive.

I'll go point-by-point on this one, because there's a few to talk about. Firstly, I've seen some people saying they expected them to make more of an "impact". Presumably wanting them to attack Roman, AJ, Shane etc. I'm not going to constantly compare the Bullet/Balor/Whatever it'll be called Club to the nWo. However, Scott Hall didn't show up on Nitro and instantly go after Savage, Sting etc. He just randomly showed up in a nothing match, and they built up from there. I'm not expecting this build to be any different.

This brings me onto my next point, and again- I'm not going to constantly bring up the nWo. The "3rd Man" discussion. I think 99% of people are expecting Finn, and Finn is the most likely candidate by quite a long way. However, I've got this sort of weird feeling that the initial group isn't going to involve Finn- and Anderson and Gallows will turn on the initial 3rd Man and align with Finn later down the line.

This all stems from an idea I was sort of toying with over Mania Weekend when I was thinking about Booking Blogs I could do once the Football Season's over. This idea I was toying with, was to have Roman be the "3rd Man". I realise everyone apart from me probably thinks it's a horrendous idea, but I think it'd be absolutely genius. If it's me booking, I have Roman/AJ at Payback and Gallows and Anderson interfere- we get the sort of teaser of their past lives with AJ before they beat the fuck out of him allowing Roman to retain. To me, this accomplishes the objective of protecting AJ, keeping the Title on Roman and giving Roman's Character the massive reset button it needs.

As I said, it wouldn't be the long-term plan however- and a bit down the line once Gallows and Anderson are fully trusted in Roman's eyes the "master plan" comes into effect and they turn on him with Finn debuting in the same segment. To me, the end-game of the Bullet/Balor Club coming in should be Finn as WWE Champion and Gallows and Anderson as Tag Champs- with others possibly coming into the group at some point to monopolise the Titles in WWE. The WWE have got something special here, and I'm just praying to god that they don't fuck it up.

Miz & Maryse, Cesaro Backstage Segment
I really liked this segment. Maryse's English has improved massively since she was last in WWE- and that's good in one way. But, there was something beautifully annoying about how disjointed it was in her initial run. Miz & Maryse are going to be such a fun pairing, they've obviously got chemistry with each other and Miz just "gets" being a Heel. I know people will say Owens, but it's still the "cool" thing to like Owens. Miz is pretty much the only true Heel left in the WWE. You don't want to cheer for him at any point with anything he does. I liked the little Cesaro bit, and Maryse's whole stopping Miz drinking "domestic water" bit was really funny. All-in-all this segment was really good.

AJ Styles v Sami Zayn
This was the second of two matches tonight, where it was just so clear that the WWE are trying to put of an emphasis on the Wrestling side of things at the moment. We had two really long matches between 4 of, if not the 4 best Wrestlers in the Company at the moment. Again, it's literally impossible for these two to have a bad match with each other. I mean, Sami dying when he landed on his head may have taken a Star or two off- but that would still have ranked it was an Above Average match.

I don't know if it's because I'm so accustomed to shenanigans in matches to further a feud, but I had a sort of fixed idea in my head that nothing was going to happen until Owens was back in the Arena driving a Tim Horton's Truck that the finish caught me a bit off guard. I'M NOT USED TO CLEAN FINISHES IN BIG RAW MATCHES FOR GOD SAKE, WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME WWE?! Overall, this was another really good match- on a really good show.

The Highlight Reel Ambrose Asylum w/ Chris Jericho
It's not often I get properly serious in these Reviews. Everything I say is done with somewhat of a light-hearted manner I like to think. However, sometimes it's unavoidable. Like when I ended up talking about a possible ISIS Attack for Hell in a Cell (?) Last Year for example. Last Night is another one of the times that's prompted me to be serious.

We witnessed a horrible, horrible accident last night. As Dean Ambrose gave Chris Jericho the Dirty Deeds, the Potted Plant that Ambrose brought out tragically fell from its standing and died right before our eyes. I'm expecting Riots on the streets today, protests outside of Deans House, #PlantLivesMatter to be trending worldwide. WE SHOULDN'T STAND FOR THIS, GUYS! WHAT DID THAT POTTED PLANT DO TO ANYONE?! HE WAS AN INNOCENT BYSTANDER! HE DIDN'T DO SHIT!

So I'm sure you'll all join me in paying our respects to the Potted Plant during a week of mourning.

Apollo Crews v Adam Rose
If there was one weak segment last night, it was this one. Even then, this still had a defined purpose in the sense of building Crews up. I suppose the fact this was probably the weakest segment is a testament to how good RAW was last night. It still did a good job of putting Crews over, and Rose did well with what he got.

Golden Truth Backstage
This capped off a decent night in the history of RAW Guest Hosts. Dr. Phil wasn't at all invasive in the way he was featured on TV. He had the tease of Flair and Charlotte splitting up, put over the Womens Division which to me was his main purpose and then we got a little bit of comedy with this segment. This was by far the best Golden Truth segment in my opinion, apart from maybe Goldust writing "No" on Truth's Forehead, Truth looking in the Mirror and thinking it said "On". IT'S ON!

Bray Wyatt & Roman Reigns v The League of Nations (Sheamus & Alberto Del Rio)
Can someone correct me if I'm wrong here, but did Bray Wyatt look absolutely amazing last night or what? It's almost as if he wasn't systematically de-railed by the WWE in a long-term effort to get him off TV. I think in the future whenever someone says "X" has been buried to me I'll ask for their definition of the word "Burial"- because it's probably the most over-used word in Wrestling nowadays. Even Jericho's using it as a sort of "hint, hint, nudge, nudge" joke at the expense of fans over-using it now.

This was equal parts weird and good. As I just said, Bray Wyatt looked absolutely great last night. I'm not sure what to expect from Bray over the next few months, as I've already said the Main Event scene would be populated by AJ, Roman, Bullet/Balor Club and then Finn over the next 6 or so Months if it were up to me. So, ideally they keep giving Bray a big spotlight on RAWs as they did tonight and build him/the Family up with wins over the League of Nations- and perhaps even New Day before they likely re-commence the feud with Brock for Summerslam.

Long-Term, and I think the massive reaction to Bray's Hot-Tag and just Bray in general last night as a Babyface I think we're going to get Bray/Triple H. Possibly at next years Mania, although the "Bring Down the Machine" part of the feud I booked for the potential feud in my "Booking Wrestlemania 32" blog over a year ago will most likely not be relevant anymore. At least not in the sense of Triple H being recognised as part of "The Authority".

It's worth repeating on good nights for Bray as well as bad, time is on his side. In the last 4 Months they've teased Bray/Triple H, Wyatts/League of Nations (which they're currently doing), Brock/Bray and as recently as last night Bray/Roman. In short, he's not going anywhere in a hurry.

As I've already said, this was one of the best RAWs top to bottom in absolutely ages. Put it this way, if we start getting RAWs to this level every week then there'll be very little to complain about in these Blogs. Which is absolutely fine, I'm a big believer in the Power of Positivity after all.

Thanks for reading as always, as the Football Season's coming into its last month or so expect there to be a few more Wrestling Posts once it's done- think Booking Blogs, Opinion Pieces etc. Thanks again for reading, and remember. #PlantLivesMatter.

Saturday 9 April 2016

Fulham v Cardiff Review: The Perfect Week.

Hello! Well, this week hasn't been half-bad has it? 3 (League) Wins in a Row for the first time in 4 Years, going from 1 Point clear of Relegation to 10 with 5 Games left to play- and I think the best thing is, we're actually looking like a proper team. Before I dive into the game, and it's definitely an interesting one- I thought I'd make a point of highlight just how weird our season's been. Of the team that started today, only one of them started the reverse fixture all the way back in August;

Bettinelli (Injured/Bench)
Stearman (Wolves)
Madl (Sturm Graz)
Amorebieta (Exiled)
Garbutt (Injured)
Tunnicliffe (Suspended)
Parker (Injured)
Ince (Brighton)
Hyndman (Exiled/Bench)
McCormack (Started)
Dembele (Bench)

It's been a mental season, and I think if you put a £5 Bet on for Both Teams to Score in the Cardiff game in August- and then just kept putting a £5 Bet on BTTS in every game after you'd be a Millionaire by now. The Cardiff Goal was coming, and I'll fully admit it. The First-Half from Cardiff was probably one of the best I've seen from a team at the Cottage this season. They restricted us to one Hyndman Shot after a mazy run and a McCormack Free-Kick in-terms of testing Marshall- and they'd had us pressed into our own Half for the majority of the Half. It was a good ball in from Gunnarsson and with how stretched our defence was at the time, Immers ended up with a Free-Header that Bettinelli couldn't do much to stop.

The two Fulham Goals were great for different reasons. I was one of Parker's biggest critics under Kit. He had the occasional game like Derby where he was suddenly the Parker we'd all seen him be at West Ham and to a lesser extent Spurs and England. I'm not saying Parker's been playing at that level under Jokanovic- but he's been absolutely immense. In short, if there was a player who's deserved a Goal on the back of how they've been playing lately- it is Scott Parker. I doubt Parker's wages could be met, and even if they could it's probably best he doesn't stay on- at least not as a Player. However, if we could keep Parker around as a Coach I'd be really happy because he's exactly the sort of character we need in and around the Squad.

Talking about deserved goals, we move onto a Last Minute Winner that's actually been scored in our favour- again for the first time in god knows how long. When McCormack had hit the bar a minute or so earlier, I thought we'd be putting this game down to one of those "fine margins" games that just didn't quite go our way after how the 2nd Half had gone. Then, from a Corner there was a bit of a scramble and I thought Christensen had blown the chance when he took a really heavy touch and took it into the 6 Yard Box area. But he didn't, he managed to cut it back to Hyndman and it was a really good finish from him to get the goal and win on his Birthday.

Apart from obviously the Goal we conceded, which is pretty much a given in every game we play- I don't really remember Bettinelli having much to do. There were a couple of shots straight at him, and obviously the one that hit the Post at the end of the 1st Half that worried everyone- but apart from that Cardiff were largely restricted to Long-Shots and half chances.

I'm not sure if Michael Madl was injured, or it was a tactical move- my instinct at the time of Madl's Substitution was it was the former because although we conceded I thought Madl had a decent half. He's by far and a way the best actual defender we've got at the Club- and while it's not confirmed yet, I think we can tentatively start planning for next season in the Championship and Madl should definitely be in those plans.

I thought Stearman in particular of the Defenders that played the 90 Minutes today was absolutely immense today. It didn't all go his way in the 1st Half, and there were a couple of worrying moments when Stearman was up against Zohore in the 2nd Half- but overall he's been great today. Especially 2nd Half when we were trying everything to get that 2nd Goal after such a quick first one- Stearman was key in retrieving the ball and getting the ball back up the pitch as quickly as possible. Amorebieta's had another good game on the whole, it's not a coincidence that with Jokanovic finally settling on a Centre-Back pairing and sticking with it that doesn't involve Burn in Madl and Amorebieta (and Stearman and Amorebieta 2nd Half) that we've started winning and conceding less. Garbutt looked a bit iffy today and some of his "challenges" were definitely "interesting" and it's a miracle he wasn't booked. Of the Loan Players on show today- he's probably the only one I'd be more than happy to see the back of in the Summer.

I talked about it on Tuesday as well, Parker turned into another "Captains Innings" today. I think it was pretty much a given that he wasn't going the distance today- but he was just top quality for the 75 or so minutes he was on the pitch. I don't know what Jokanovic has done/said to him, but this is by far the best and most consistent Parker's been since he's been at Fulham- so full credit to both. Obviously passing is a big part of Football, but take passing out of the equation and Rohan Ince has had a near-perfect game today.

He's the player I've basically said we've been lacking since I started doing these Reviews (and Previews, I haven't completely abandoned them) in that he's a proper Holding-Mid that can sit in-front of the Back Four and protect them. Going back to my earlier point, it's not a coincident that we're unbeaten since Ince has come back into the team and we've only conceded 1 in 4 consecutive games as opposed to 2 or 3. I thought Hoogland could have done the job if Kit allowed him to, we only really had Mattila for the first half of the season- and now in Ince we've got someone who can really do the job. To me, it looked like Tunnicliffe had picked up a bit of a knock before he was Subbed today- he definitely wasn't moving completely freely let's put it that way.

Given what Jokanovic has said in regard to Hyndman Post-Match, with they key line to me being "I believe in the future he can be a very important player for us" it appears as though Slavisa at least hasn't lost hope of retaining Hyndman next season. Do I think he will? The answer really is I don't know at this point. I'm not sure how long Cairney's out for, but I wouldn't be leaving Hyndman out of the team for our last 5 games regardless and I would hope that Hyndman's main motivation would be to play Football- so if Jokanovic could give him sort of guarantee in-terms of game-time who knows.

If Hyndman can perform like he did today, there wouldn't even need to be some sort of guarantee because Hyndman will effectively be picking himself. He was just absolutely immense from Minute 1 and his performance today- as with Parker's recently was more than deserving of a goal.

It was a weird game for McCormack and Dembele today. Dembele had the really good Assist for Parker, but especially in his case it just didn't quite fall for him today. His performance wasn't really lacking much, it was just a small margin on things like a Long-Ball that fell just too far in-front of Dembele or Marshall just getting to the ball in-front of Dembele from a Through-Ball or Fredericks putting the ball just behind him when he tried to square it rather than shoot that went wrong for him today. It was good in a way that Dembele and McCormack didn't score, because they've more than done their bit in trying to keep us up- and we've finally got someone other than those two or Cairney on the score sheet. McCormack's just such a special player, and I'm thankful that we're staying up because it most likely means we're getting at least 1 more season out of him in a Fulham Shirt.

Depending on what the Madl Sub was for, all Three Subs were really out of necessity today- but they were definitely effective. If Fredericks had the confidence to shoot when he was put through on Goal we may have been 2-1 up a lot sooner than we ended up being, but instead he tried to square it to Dembele and the chance was blown when he put it slightly behind him. Aside from that, I thought Fredericks was decent- it looked like he picked up an injury in the last 10 or so minutes because he was limping around and not getting up and down the line as much as he was before. Indecisiveness and Injuries are really all that's holding Fredericks back from a really successful career at Fulham.

Christensen obviously got the Assist for Hyndman, and it was good to see him back- even if this season hasn't really gone his way I haven't completely lost hope in him given his age and general experience. Hopefully a Summer under Jokanovic, Gray and the other Coaches we've got in now can get him back to the level we know he's capable of. Baird was decent on the whole today, although he didn't really have much to do other than not slow down the play when we tried to push the ball up the pitch. It was great to see how Baird celebrated after the game, and you can tell this Club means a lot to him.

I'm not going to go over-board, but I genuinely think now that we're playing with the fight to match our quality- and especially now, we're playing with considerably less pressure than a Week Ago we could possibly get something out of Brighton. Even if we don't, and I've said this throughout I don't care how we stay up as long as we do. The Brighton Review will be up on Friday Night, and then we head into a run of 4 winnable games in my opinion. Thanks for reading as always, enjoy this week everyone- it doesn't get much better.

Wednesday 6 April 2016

Preston North End v Fulham Review: A Massive Step Towards Safety

My hands have just about stopped shaking now, and what a day (and week) this is turning into from a Fulham perspective. Between the win against MK Dons on Saturday, and then heading into tonight with Rotherham and Bristol City winning, MK Dons losing and of course our win tonight- we've taken an absolutely massive step toward our continued survival in the Championship. Being 7 Points clear with 6 Games left, after being 1 Point clear of MK Dons heading into Saturdays game just goes to show the change in fortunes we've had over this week. In short, we're infinitely more secure than we were a week ago- and it's come as a result of us showing the fight to match our undoubted quality on the pitch. Well, that combined with a bit of luck.

I'm loving these Reviews all of a sudden, let's talk about the Goals. In pretty much the only thing that happened in the whole 1st Half, pretty much out of nothing- a Tim Ream long ball was just sent up the pitch, McCormack got the better of the Centre-Back and when Ross McCormack's 1-on-1 with the Goalkeeper 99 times out of 100 he's going to put it into the back of the net. Hopefully we can keep pulling away from the Relegation Zone now and we don't get complacent, because McCormack and our second Goalscorer have been way too good this season to be involved in a Relegation Battle.

The Preston goal was actually really good, it's definitely a lot easier to say that in a game that we've won. Vermijl completely sold Tunnicliffe, then got the better of Parker and Bettinelli couldn't really do much to stop it. With how the 2nd Half was going, I always thought our best bet of scoring would be from either a bit of luck, a Set-Piece or a moment of quality. Dembele's goal ended up being a bit of all three. Pretty much out of nothing, we had a Free-Kick in McCormack range- McCormack bends in an absolutely quality Free-Kick that Lindegaard just about managed to save. Dembele gets the rebound and completely out of nothing we were 2-1 up in a game where we were being completely battered. That's of course how it ended, thank god.

Marcus Bettinelli was good when called upon for the most part today. There was of course the scary moment late-on when Beckford managed to get in the way of his clearance, but apart from that he did quite well today. It's just great to see Bettinelli back in the team, and despite conceding again today- it doesn't look like his injury has done any long-term damage. The sooner he gets his first Clean Sheet back the better.

Fernando Amorebieta's taken a lot of criticism since he's been back, with some of it being justified without a doubt. However, tonight he was absolutely immense first at Centre-Back and then at Left-Back. In-terms of defensive performances, I genuinely can't remember many better over the course of this season- although there's not exactly a wide variety to pick from. Michael Madl delivered the level of performance I think we expect of him now in-terms of an on the ground defender. I thought Jokanovic was smart to take him off the for SEVEN BLOODY MINUTES of Injury Time because as is the case in most matches balls will increasingly get launched into the box the longer they're behind.

I thought Tim Ream had a pretty good First-Half, that was of course unfortunately it for him though with the injury he was presumably getting treated for toward the end of the First-Half. But I do think Ream's done pretty well since he's come back in, and I hope his injury isn't too serious. I thought Ryan Fredericks had a fairly decent game today I thought today. It's not exactly new to say in-terms of pure pace he's probably the best option we've had for a while- but he is. As I said in Saturday's Review, he's a completely different option at Full-Back to Stearman, and it's up to Jokanovic's discretion who he uses when in our 6 remaining matches.

I was surprised to see Scott Parker in the team tonight to be honest, but he was more than worth his place. I said it back in my MK Dons Review, Scott Parker under Jokanovic has turned into our most consistent player- and hopefully if we can stay up it's going to be a lot harder to replace Parker than you'd have thought a few months ago. He was just absolutely immense, once again and there's talks about "Captains Innings"- and Parker's delivered yet another tonight. Another player who I thought was absolutely great tonight was Rohan Ince. You can go back to my Reviews before I got ill and took a break, I was saying pretty much weekly that we needed to be playing a Proper DM to sit in front of, and protect the Back Four. At the time we only really mad Mattila capable of playing the role- but now we've got Ince, and he's actually being played the pieces of the team are 100% falling into place. I don't know if Ince would want to join permanently this Summer given how his first few months here went, but provided we stay up I'd make it an absolute priority- along with signing nearly a whole new defence that we got Ince or a player like him. I thought Tunnicliffe did pretty well today, it's funny how he's ended up being booked for Time-Wasting again tonight in pretty much identical circumstances (dawdling over a throw). It's not a massive thing, but from my point of view he really "gets" the game management side of Football and winding the clock down.

Tom Cairney going off injured was really unfortunate from our point of view, and especially with us playing Ince, Parker and Tunnicliffe we really need Cairney fit to keep the balance of the team. Primarily I hope Cairney's alright of course, but it's definitely going to be interesting to see what Jokanovic does to replace Cairney in the team- and unfortunately we may end having to see McCormack drop deep(er than usual) for a game or two.

As I've already said, McCormack and Dembele from a Goalscoring perspective are just way too good to be where we are in the Table. If we stay up, and despite the gap we've now got- with how our season's gone it's still an "if" it's thanks to Dembele and of course more so McCormack. I think I saw that McCormack's a Goal/Assist away from contributing to 30 Goals this season- and Dembele's a Goal/Assist away from 20. For a team that's basically been fighting Relegation to varying degrees since November, that's ridiculous. Apart from the goals, neither really did much else tonight to be honest though. For me, the First-Half didn't really get going between Preston's two injuries- and then the Second Half was really all Preston- which didn't really give either much of a chance to "shine".

The Stearman Sub for Ream was of course necessary, and I thought Stearman was immense on the whole. It's not been Stearman's season- to put it bluntly- however of the Defenders we've got I'd pick Stearman in a heartbeat in the sort of backs to wall defensive display we had to put in 2nd Half. The O'Hara Sub was of course necessary as well with Cairney's injury, and he did fine on the whole. I wouldn't be looking to renew his Contract unless we went down- but he's still had his moments this season without a doubt he's just tailed off as the season's gone on. As I've already said, I thought Dan Burn coming on for Injury time was smart with his obvious height advantage. I'm interested to see if we renew Burn's Contract this Summer, because Jokanovic obviously saw something in him for him to be starting for as long as he did under him.

Tonight wasn't exactly a world class "Barcelona-esque" performance from us, but that's not what we needed tonight. We needed to battle, and fight for every ball- and for the most part we did. We're finally showing the fight to match the quality we have- and with it being a surprise to nobody- with us doing that we're finally picking up wins. I think with how this season's gone and with MK Dons seemingly struggling if we can pick up 2 more wins- of the 6 games left we'll be safe. The most important thing though is to either maintain or extend our gap on MK Dons now. We can't afford to be sucked back into this Relegation scrap once again- and we can guarantee that by not relying on other teams slipping up. Granted it's definitely helped that MK Dons have lost again tonight, but I want us to stay up under our own steam- and not by having to rely on MK Dons losing the majority of their games left this season.

Hopefully we can keep this good run on Saturday with another battling performance, and another result to match. The Review will of course be up again on Saturday, and hopefully you'll be back again fr that one. Thanks for reading as always, I hope you have a good rest of the week. It's amazing what a couple of wins do for your morale. At this rate we'll win the League.

Tuesday 5 April 2016

RAW Review: 4th April

Well, wasn't last night just infinitely better than Wrestlemania? It's funny, and I was thinking about this quite a bit yesterday after I put my RAW Review up. I, as I'm sure most of everyone reading this would class myself as a really involved Wrestling Fan- in the sense that I actually care about certain people going over etc. and at Wrestlemania, with the exception of Brock/Ambrose my main issue with all of the matches weren't that the match was bad- just that the wrong person went over. Casual Fans don't really care about that, and it was them that this years Mania was aimed at- between the Free Month and all of the Mainstream Coverage they got. So with that in mind, I think everyone in WWE will have seen Mania as a success.

There's a lot of stuff to talk about for this Review, so I'm not going to delay any further and we'll just jump head first into this Review.

Shane & Vince McMahon Opening Segment
This wasn't really much. The bit just before Vince came out annoyed me, because they in so many more words basically said "Roman's gonna get booed to fuck, just ignore that- this crowd isn't a good representation of our 'usual' audience".

Anyway, the Vince and Shane segment wasn't much- it was fun to see Shane still after Wrestlemania. He might still hang around for a few more weeks, or he might not- if it were up to me Shane would be written off by being attacked Backstage to leave it open for a return once Shane's gone back to his Japanese PPV's or whatever.

New Day v The League of Nations (Sheamus & Barrett)- Tag Titles
This was of course quite likely Wade Barrett's last appearance in WWE. Granted as a fellow Brit I may have been pushing extra hard for Barrett to succeed, but I genuinely can't think of many more fucked up wrestlers in-terms of potential vs the push they actually got. Yes, injuries played a part- but the fact Barrett was never WWE Champion when Nexus were at their peak is mind-blowing to me.

New Day were their usual amazing selves in the Pre-Match stuff, between the last Booty'O and them putting over the Lion King. I'm still quite annoyed about what happened to New Day at Mania, but all we can do is move on quickly and just appreciate New Day and hope they keep going from strength to strength.

The match was decent, everyone involved in this match was a pretty fucking good worker- and these two teams have wrestled each other enough times both as part of teams and individually to know how to get the best out of each other. The finish wasn't quite what I expected, in the sense that I thought Barrett would just be pinned clean out of nowhere leading up to what happened after- but it still worked quite well for me.

We then had the Post-Match attack on Barrett to presumably write him off of TV, and it was all but confirmed when The Wyatts screen effect hit and they appeared and attacked the League of Nations. Obviously with Harper injured and Barrett leaving it's 3v3- but it does make me wonder how long they've had this feud planned for, because they teased it MONTHS ago when it would have been a 4v4. I will say I'm looking forward to it though, and I'm just praying that The Wyatts win.

Vince Backstage Promo
I must admit, a small part of me was expecting Vince's Limo to blow up.

Sasha Banks v Summer Rae
Any time I get to see Summer Rae on RAW I'm happy. I was putting over these two's history in NXT- even if Commentary wasn't and that enhanced the match for me. The match wasn't much, it was just a case of having Sasha go over relatively strong after obviously missing out at Wrestlemania via shenanigans. They probably would've had Becky wrestle as well at some point, but she'd completely fucked her eye up.

Apollo Crews v Tyler Breeze
I predicted an Apollo Crews call-up at the turn of the year on Twitter. He hasn't really progressed beyond the "nice guy" Babyface who smiles a lot in NXT. However, Crews is pretty much perfect for current WWE. He's absolutely built, and then he has the offence that can pop a crowd at a moments notice. I said at the turn of the year that Crews will have been called-up and have the proverbial Rocket on his back- and I still firmly believe that.

I'm interested to see the character development of Crews on the Main Roster and who his first feud's with- but for now I was just happy to see him and get the pay-off of one of my (quite a few) successful predictions from last night.

The match was nothing more than a showcase of what Crews can do, which was fine by me. It is a shame that Breeze was the one doing the job, but I suppose that's wrestling sometimes.

Roman Reigns, AJ Styles, Chris Jericho, Kevin Owens, Sami Zayn Segment
I actually quite liked this segment. To me at least, the job of a Heel is to make sure the crowd want anyone who said Heel is wrestling to beat the fuck out of the Heel and win. Roman Reigns is a Heel, literally anyone could be pitted against Roman and they're the most over Babyface in the entire company. Even things like last night with Roman saying "He's not a Good Guy or a Bad Guy, he's THE guy". That to me just screams Heel. I could be wrong, but to me that line told me that the Roman Character has finally gotten self-aware.

The segment was good in setting the 4-Way up for later, and on the whole I just really liked it. Without a doubt the highlight being the fact that Owens and Zayn just can't be near each other without having to trade punches. I know a lot of people were expecting Owens/Zayn at Mania, but I can't wait for these two to wrestle each other at Payback- in a match that has a pretty good chance of stealing the show.

Baron Corbin v Dolph Ziggler
I think I said it in my Mania Review yesterday, if Baron Corbin can continue his development at the rate he has done- he can really be something special in the WWE. Everything about Baron Corbin is just a perfect Heel, and he looked absolutely great last night. After the whole count-out angle, I was expecting a Cesaro run-in. Feel free to disagree, but I think Cesaro would be a perfect first Main Roster feud for Corbin. They've got the Andre Battle Royal connection, and Cesaro fits perfectly with Corbin's whole Anti-Indy gimmick. It could still happen don't get me wrong, but just because I was expecting the run-in the segment Post-End of Days felt a bit weird to me.

The Miz v Zack Ryder- IC Title
I feel like this is the right time to say it, because I predicted Maryse interfering and Miz winning the IC Title. Someone brought this up last night, I wasn't on Reddit for the whole day yesterday because I knew r/SC would be on Suicide Watch after Mania and I just had no desire to see endless bitching with the occasional GIF. Apparently that FalconArrow bloke said something similar, but it wasn't exactly a hard prediction if you put some thought into it. Especially with Owens and Zayn busy, Ryder was never going to keep the IC Title for long. Ryder pushed Miz off to win the Title at Mania. Maryse was a very strong return rumour. It doesn't take a genius to connect the dots.

I liked the angle with Zack's Dad actually, although I'm not sure how Zack's Dad pushing Miz wasn't a DQ. The match was pretty good, and I'm actually really happy with the outcome. I've said it a few times recently, but The Miz has been absolutely amazing so far this year, whether it was with AJ, Sami or basically anyone he's worked with. Add Maryse into the mix as Miz's valet/manager, with their obvious chemistry and Miz can hopefully keep going from strength to strength.

Womens Championship Presentation Ceremony
This segment was never going to get over unless Bayley came out. The crowd wanted Bayley and only Bayley. Even when Charlotte tried putting over the crowd to try and get a pop the crowd just didn't give a fuck. In that sense, it was poor planning- and especially with how the segment went I wish Charlotte would've just gone off script and Heel'd it up on the Bayley not appearing front. They tried too hard to have Charlotte act like a Babyface before getting cocky, and in time when Charlotte gets more experience she'll know when it's best to just "tear up the script".

I'm quite annoyed that Charlotte's first feud with the new Womens Championship is seemingly going to be against Nattie. I really like her, but for me they needed to try and go from strength to strength with the Womens Championship and not change the winning formula of Charlotte against Becky and/or Sasha until they'd properly established the Title and what it would represent. I'm not saying Nattie's a bad choice, but we've had Charlotte beat Nattie god knows how many times in the last few months. I will admit, I very briefly thought Bret had shown up when Nattie's music hit- and all in all this segment just felt a bit disappointing.

Epico & Primo's Puerto Rico Vignette
I will say one thing positive about this, I did like Epico & Primo when they were just Epico & Primo. I thought while they were perhaps a bit bland they "got it" when it came to being a Heel- and they even managed to make Rosa a valuable part of an act on the show. That's not exactly easy. God knows what this gimmick's going to entail other than perhaps entering with a Puerto Rican flag tied around their neck like a Cape. I'm patiently awaiting their re-debut, I'll put it like that.

The Dudleys v The Usos- Tables Match
I think the end to this match can, in quite a few ways sum up the feud between these two teams. In short, it was a complete botch. If you skipped it, which I wouldn't really blame you for doing- basically The Usos went to Splash The Dudleys through respective Tables as they did last night and the Dudleys moved out of the way sending them crashing through Tables. The key point being, The Dudleys moved- they didn't actually put them through a Table. SOMEONE SHOULD HAVE TOLD THE TIMEKEEPER THAT. It completely took away from an otherwise alright- albeit nothing special match.

Enzo Amore & Big Cass' Debut
This was another one of my Predictions that came off, in that I predicted we'd get Enzo & Cass/The Dudleys rather than Enzo & Cass going right after the Tag Titles. I thought it hadn't happened when they went to the Ad Break after The Dudleys had won- but thankfully they were still out there when they came back.

My one worry when it comes to Enzo & Cass, the Night after Mania crowd is basically the smarkiest crowd of the year. You can pretty much guarantee 95+% of the Crowd knew who they were and Enzo's whole "My name is..." speech. That's great, but once Enzo's in-front of a Flat Crowd in the 3rd Hour of RAW in Dayton, Ohio- if the crowd doesn't respond to him and Cass- they've lost all of their appeal. I would hope Enzo's charisma in particular could get them over for the "casual" audience, but its far from a guarantee. Much in the way of The Vaudevillains' Smackdown debut, I'm just not sure how it'll translate to the bigger arenas and not in-front of the die-hard crowds.

With all that said, I did love this segment- and it was probably the highlight of the night.

Kevin Owens attacks Sami Zayn Backstage
I realise this was before the Enzo & Cass angle, but it made more sense to Review those two segments together. I liked this angle a lot, it's obviously in preparation for an Owens/Zayn Payback match- and obviously it facilitated Cesaro's return. In short, this was just a really good angle- and hopefully the rest of the build will match it. They can pretty much give Zayn and Owens anything and they'd make it work.

AJ Styles v Chris Jericho v Cesaro v Kevin Owens- #1 Contender Fatal 4-Way
I suppose I'll start with Cesaro's return. It was absolutely great. Everything about Cesaro's return just worked. I was wondering where they were going with the whole Suit thing, but they literally had Cesaro do the Superman thing of ripping the suit off and transitioning into his "battle" mode. I just loved it. I'm not exactly sure what Cesaro does after tonight, as I said earlier if I had to guess it would be Corbin. However, basically all I want out of Cesaro's return is for him to get the treatment he deserves as a sort of Dean Ambrose level Wrestler where they're not quite in the Main Event picture- but they're still Main Eventing and can face-off against some of the biggest names. For instance, I'm dying to see a Cesaro/Brock match- that hopefully wouldn't be a squash.

Next we move on to the winner, and that was of course AJ Styles. I'm not certain of anything in the WWE after Wrestlemania and Styles losing to Jericho. However, if I had to make a prediction for Roman/Styles at this stage- I'd say Gallows and Anderson crash the Main Event and take out AJ and/or Roman. I'll be interested to see how they build the match after tonight, and basically how Roman acts toward AJ. In short, there's absolutely zero chance AJ does win the Title at Fast Lane- however in my opinion there's also very little chance that Roman just outright beats AJ.

Owens has Zayn for Payback, and I'm definitely interested to see where Jericho goes now. Had Ryder still had the Belt I'd have probably guessed that. Now, I'm not so sure.

Overall I really enjoyed this RAW. However, the sheer volume of Adverts last night was absolutely ridiculous. I said it on Twitter as well, imagine if you'd watched Wrestlemania- and as I've already brought up you didn't really care who won and then decided to watch RAW. You would have gotten about 5 Minutes of Wrestling followed by 5 Minutes of Adverts for basically 3 Hours straight. If that was my first impression of RAW, I wouldn't be coming back next week.

Thanks for reading as always, we're coming toward the end of Wrestlemania Week on here- with there only being one more post tomorrow which'll be "Booking Wrestlemania 33". I did it last year as well, it's basically me predicting the Wrestlemania card a year out and then we can look back on how wrong I was this time next year. In the meantime thanks for reading, and let's just look forward to hopefully a good few months now we've got people like Cesaro back, with Cena, Rollins, Orton etc. not far behind.

Monday 4 April 2016

Wrestlemania 32 Review

Hello! This Wrestlemania Weekend, also known as the "Cost Sam as much Sleep as possible" week is drawing to a close now. Well, yesterday was definitely interesting. I'd said multiple times heading into last night that everyone needed to approach the Mania with an open mind after Takeover and not bury it before it's even happened. Well, while not everything on the show was bad- there's definitely gonna be some burying done throughout the course of this Review.

There's definitely some burying to be done. However, I feel like I need to open by saying this. A lot of people I see on Twitter build up a picture of what should happen in Wrestling in their heads, and then if something doesn't live up to the expectations they've basically set up for themselves they deem it to be bad. That's simply put Wrestling Fans living in a Fantasy World. I'm not one of those fans, I'm very realistic in what I expect from a show. With that in mind, there's 11 matches to Review, and in some cases a lot to be said- so I'm not going to ramble any more and I'll just dive right in.

Pre-Show: Kalisto v Ryback- US Title
It doesn't make much of a difference, because my Predictions were fucking terrible yesterday- but the reason I predicted a Title change in this match was because I thought it would be on the USA Network part of the Pre-Show. I thought they'd want to put over an "anything can happen" type of mentality with a Title change in a bid to get some people to go "Oh shit, there was a Title change for free- I wonder what'll happen on the Main Show". That of course didn't happen, but on the whole I thought this match was alright. It was never going to blow everyones minds, but they did the whole "David vs Goliath" angle pretty well I thought- and Kalisto managed to"slay the giant" in Ryback to give him his Mania moment.

Pre-Show: Team Total Divas v Team BAD & Blonde
I'd reconciled this match in my head by saying, "Emma and Summer have got on Mania". So that's what I'll repeat- however this match played out, Emma and Summer did get on Mania. This match actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be to be honest. In arguably the biggest shock of the night, Eva Marie did a Flying Head Scissors without murdering someone. I thought they were smart to have Paige take the majority of the Heat Segment for obvious reasons, Lana looked good with all of her Kicks- especially for her first Wrestling match ever. As I said in my Predictions though, this match was basically the opportunity for;
a) Giving Brie a Wrestlemania send-off win
b) Have said Brie Wrestlemania win be the Total Divas Finale

In that respect they did their jobs really well, and we were only left with one question at the end of the day. WHAT IN THE FUCK DOES NAOMI MEAN WHEN SHE SHOUTS "FEEL MY GLOW"?

Pre-Show: The Usos v The Dudleys
Once again, this match was pretty much as "by the book" as I thought it would be. It was a pretty standard match, with one could argue Bubba trying way too hard to try and get some heat on himself to compensate for the lack of a build. The Usos won after a little while, and then they put The Dudleys through Tables to end the feud.

You see, this was 100% predictable, but predictable isn't always a bad thing. In fact, I'd argue most of the time it's a good thing. When people are predicting something, they're weighing up the chances of something happening using logic. So, this was by far the most logical choice. This whole Pre-Show was booked with logic and everything made sense. WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED FROM THIS POINT ON?!

IC Title Ladder Match
On the whole, I thought this was quite a fun match. Everyone got their spots in, we had the usual "crash and burn" spots with Stardust going through a Ladder via Sin Cara etc., We got the Sami Zayn/Kevin Owens spots that the crowd were desperate for,  and all in all I thought this was a perfectly acceptable 2016 Ladder Match. I say that, basically because there's not an awful lot of Ladder Match spots that haven't already been done. The last Ladder Match spot that blew my mind other than Kalisto's Salida del Sol at TLC was in the Ziggler/Harper match at the previous years TLC- and that was pretty much just because of the sheer brutality of the match.

I'm going to reserve judgement on Zack Ryder's IC Title win until my RAW Review tomorrow. Call me suspicious, but I can't see Ryder hanging on to the Title for long when two or three weeks ago he wasn't even in the fucking match. I knew Zack was winning as soon as he did the Elbow Drop off the Ladder, and it was just a case of "How?" and I thought they did a pretty job making sure Zack won, but still protected- with respect to Zack the much better competitors in Owens and Zayn.

Chris Jericho v AJ Styles
I said in my Predictions that this was one of the easiest matches to predict, and of course went for AJ Styles. You know why? Because it fucking should have. I'll keep bringing this point up as this Review progresses, they either wanted every single Babyface to lose, so in the end when Roman won they thought the crowd would finally cheer for a win. Or, they were basically trying too hard to be "unpredictable" with their outcomes at the expense of any sort of logic or common sense.

I thought the match was okay, without being anything more. To me, there's a different between Jericho working a "Heel" style which is quite slow- and simply being too slow and I'm not sure which side of that line he ended up on by the end of the match. Something just seemed a bit "off" about this match to me, there were times when both guys looked a bit lost and were visibly trying to call spots and it just seemed weird. I don't know if I'd have had a better opinion of the match had they pulled off the finish 100% as intended, but they even managed to make that look messy- which basically summed up the match. Two very good wrestlers, having a really messy match.

Also, I have to laugh at the fact the Styles Clash has been kicked out of 2 out of the 3 times it's been used in WWE. Well Done on killing that move, WWE.

Zack Ryder Backstage Promo
It's all these talks of it being a "dream come true" for Zack and all that stuff that makes me suspect that he's losing the Title ASAP. As someone who'd jumped on the Z! TLIS train pretty early on, I don't know if I just don't want to get burned again- but I just can't see Zack having a proper run.

The League of Nations v New Day/Legends Segment
I have to assume Meltzer had simply heard through the grapevine that Michaels, Foley & Austin were going to be in the ring with New Day when he said that last night New Day were going to be put over massively. That did not happen.

Firstly, as predicted New Day's Entrance was one of the highlights of Mania- and could possibly have been the highlight if Shane wasn't a crazy motherfucker. This whole match just seemed like it had been put together at the last minute to me. It was smart for Xavier to take all of the heat segment because of his size relative to the League of Nations, but that's where my praise for this match ends. Throughout the match, I was getting more and more excited for Big E's Hot-Tag where he'd tag in and just go mental on all of the League for 2 Minutes with Belly-to-Belly's and other shit. Big E should have been a made star coming out of this match. Out of the 7 Guys involved, Big E's the only one with Main Event potential (that hasn't already been squandered). But instead Big E got 1 Belly-to-Belly, did his dive to the outside and thankfully didn't die and that was that. Kofi got taken out, and then Xavier was hit with a Bullhammer- and New Day had lost. Again, where was the logic in this? The whole stadium absolutely loved New Day- and granted the Legends did some to keep the "Hype" meter up, but it just didn't sit right with me.

Speaking of the Legends segment; look I'm never going to complain when Austin, Michaels and to a lesser extent Foley show up. Especially with Shawn in Ring Gear (I'm still not exactly sure why that was necessary). The whole clearing house of the League of Nations was fun, mainly because of Rusev's selling- especially for the Stunner. However, I just can't help but be slightly annoyed that this wasn't New Day's moment. They had the dancing spot afterwards with them, but the segment focuses were in order, Michaels, Austin & Foley, The League of Nations, New Day. New Day are 100% "my guys", and I'm just not happy with that.

Brock Lesnar v Dean Ambrose- No Holds Barred Street Fight
I had a lot of buffering during this match, so I didn't see the whole thing- but from what I did see I think the buffering may have been a good thing.

I'm bored of this Brock Lesnar. Brock is a super-human athlete as Heyman has repeatedly put over. He can do so much more than German Suplexes and F5's. It literally is like a Video Game where you just spam one move over and over until you're charged up enough to hit your finisher and you win. We've had that Brock for nearly 2 Years now, and especially with him showing up to quite a few House Shows and generally having more matches since he's signed his new deal- that's a lot of matches with the exact same formula.

This match just simply wasn't good. It was way too short to feel like the "war" it had been built up as, it was a Street Fight that didn't leave the Ring-Side area- or even go up the Ramp and there were hardly any Weapons even used. This just wasn't "No Holds Barred" or even a "Street Fight" it was standard Brock Lesnar House Show match in front of 100,000 people that just so happened to have a Kendo Stick and some Chairs involved. Ambrose didn't even kick out of 1 F5! As I said in my Predictions, I never thought Ambrose had a hope of beating Brock- but I thought he'd at least kick out of 1, if not 2 F5s. Instead it was a "one and done" deal and Brock earned probably Half a Million Dollars for one of the flattest Wrestlemania "street fights" ever.

Charlotte v Becky Lynch v Sasha Banks- WWE Womens Championship
Yes, that's right- the Divas Title is no more. We've not got the WWE Womens Championship- and above all of the other million reasons I've discussed on here about the word "Diva" it was great to get the new Title just to hear Renee completely bury the old Divas Title on the Pre-Show.

Up until this point of the show, this was without question the Match of the Night- and it was most "Wrestlemania" match of the night in my opinion. This felt like a massive deal, everything from the live performance of Sasha's Entrance with Snoop Dogg, to Charlotte's Robe made from her Dad's, to Becky's... Hat. From the moment this segment started, it was a full-on Wrestlemania moment.

These three women completely deserve all of the praise that's come their way after this match. From the moment the bell rang you knew they'd worked ridiculously hard on this match in working out of the spots and the details of the match. We had Charlotte's Moonsault that'll no doubt be in every Wrestlemania/"Divas Revolution" Video Package ever, and everything surrounding it. This match was just great, and on a Mania surrounded by a lot of mediocre segments- this was one of the ones that stood head and shoulders above the rest.

I don't even care about Charlotte winning. The result of this match wasn't as important as the performance of the three women involved in getting the new Title over and putting over the fact they were putting everything on the line for said Title. Flair's interference surprised me, just because I thought Snoop would hang around to stop it- but I suppose it fits the story and we'll be getting Charlotte/Sasha for the next few months. I just hope Becky's not forgotten about now.

The Undertaker v Shane McMahon- Hell in a Cell
I've seen a lot of people complaining about the outcome of this match, some of the points that have been raised are legitimate- and then others less legitimate. Firstly, the main reason Shane didn't win is because he's not hanging around Post-Mania. He may come back again in the near future, but apart from maybe an appearance tonight he's not going to be on TV for a while. That's the main reason Shane lost. Had he been hanging around I've got no doubt in my mind that Taker would have lost. Yes, there was the whole "last Wrestlemania" thing but they can always bring him back with some plot contrivance.

This match, if it were a legitimate fight- up until when Shane cut the Bolts off the Cell for some unknown reason would have played out exactly the same. Shane trying his best to avoid any hard strikes by Taker, and then trying to just catch him off guard whenever possible. I was convinced someone was interfering once the Cell was smashed open- and I'd also like to point out I was right in saying the Announce Desks were in danger in this match during my RAW Review and point about Shane doing the Elbow Drop. This match was essentially all structured around Shane doing that one "jump off the Cell" spot, and you know what in my book it was worth it. This was the one match where had I bought a Ticket I would have sat down after and gone "that was 100% worth it".

Now all we have to do is sit back and wait for when they set-up Taker/Cena for 33. They may even do it tonight given the obvious size of the match.

Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal (Notable Names: Baron Corbin, Shaquille O'Neal, Tatanka, DDP)
This was about as "filler Battle Royal" as you can get. It was fun without a doubt though, and unlike last year with Itami- the right person one in it being the person from NXT. I'm curious to see if that was Corbin's official call-up now. His feud with Aries surely can't be done when the match ended with a roll-up, and for me Corbin still needs a Title run in NXT and just a little more time to polish himself before he goes on the road with the Main Roster.

The Rock, John Cena & The Wyatts Segment
I said I was expecting them to set-up an angle for The Rock wrestling at Wrestlemania 33 tonight. Even with how this segment played out, I still have some hope that it'll be Bray Wyatt. I will always be a Bray Wyatt Fan- so I absolutely marked the fuck out when his music hit and he interrupted The Rock. Let me just remind everyone, the bloke's 28 Years Old. Barring injury, he's got at least 10 Years left in Wrestling should he wish to keep Wrestling. Even with a career ending injury, he could just have the Family wrestle whilst he cuts Promos. He's 28 Years Old, and he's shared a ring with John Cena, The Undertaker and now The Rock in three consecutive Wrestlemania's.

Let me just say this now, Bray Wyatt was categorically NOT buried last night. My opinion of that may change tonight depending on how it's followed up on. However, in the midst of The Rock "wrestling" Rowan and Cena's return (which I never thought I'd be so happy to see) everyone seemed to have forgotten the fact Rock spent a solid minute/minute and a half basically calling Bray the future of the fucking business. That's not a burial. Yes, he insulted them and called them stoners etc. but that's just The Rock being The Rock. As I said, depending on how this is followed up on my opinion of the segment may change. However, for now I'm perfectly fine with it. As I've said quite a few times when it comes to Bray, "Time is on his side".

We of course had Rock beat Erick Rowan, which just confirmed that I'm not crazy when I pitched the idea of The Rock & The Usos vs New Day a while back where I said they'd have Rock begging for a Tag the whole match, enter, hit the Rock Bottom, Peoples Elbow and then they've won. Cena's return was pretty well done on the whole- and I'm interested to see who his first feud back will be. All-in-all this was just a really fun segment, and had Mania ended here on an upbeat note of Cena's Return and The Rock being The Rock I think people would have been a lot happier. I'm also happy this segment ended with Rock and Cena leaving together, because as I said- I thought they'd be setting up an angle for Rock wrestling at 33 tonight. THRICE IN A LIFETIME!

Roman Reigns v Triple H- WWE Championship
I said last night, I'm going to be so interested to see what the crowds reactions are to this match once it's gone through Post-Production. There was of course the muting of the crowd last night which made me laugh, but then of course there was that story of them dubbing boos over Roman on Smackdown so who really knows.

I made reference to the Triple H/Randy Orton Main Event in my Predictions and discussing which match would go on last, and this was basically a worse version of it. Through a combination of there just not being much going for this match, Roman being Roman and the crowd being completely exhausted by the time these two went on after an already 6 Hour Long PPV- this was just such a nothing match.

The crowd still had the energy to boo Roman, and chant for NXT Guys- but that was pretty much it. Everything about this match from the moment Stephanie started her monologue was to desperately try and get some boos on Triple H- and as it's been proven in the entire build for this match, it's impossible to do that with how badly Roman's been fucked up since he attacked Triple H at TLC. I wouldn't call the match bad, it was just completely "meh". With it all being topped off by the "Cerebral Assassin" wildly swinging a Sledgehammer at Roman and eating a Spear to lose.

I said in my Takeover Review that's there's no point comparing the two until after Mania's happened- well, now we can compare the two and Takeover wins by an absolute mile. However, Mania's now in the books and there's nothing that can be done about it. The good thing about Wrestling is, there's never a break. The story just keeps on going, and in a split-second all of the perceived negatives about tonight become a non-issue. We've of course got the Night after Wrestlemania RAW tonight, and I'm massively looking forward to it. There's a lot of stuff that needs to be addressed tonight, and a lot of new feuds that have to be made- and I guess we'll only find out how well they do so by watching.

We've got some NXT call-ups to look forward to tonight, with my money being on Enzo and Cass and Samoa Joe, we have Gallows and Anderson in Texas- so you have to assume they're showing up tonight and there's so much more stuff. In short, Mania was a disappointment without a doubt. They completely abandoned logical booking and it killed it for me. However, and granted it may be because I support Fulham and am therefore a glutton for punishment- I'm still looking forward to tonight.

Whether my excitement is well placed can only be found out on here tomorrow for the RAW Review, where hopefully you'll be coming back here for. In the meantime, I hope you've enjoyed this Review and thanks for reading as always. Hopefully you'll be tagging along on Twitter, and if you haven't already done so and you want to let me know if you want to join the Fantasy WWE thing I do- with the deadline to sign up being basically once RAW's over and I've gone to bed. Thanks again for reading, and Happy Night after Mania RAW Day!

Sunday 3 April 2016

Wrestlemania 32 Predictions

Right then, it's the "big one". It's Wrestlemania, and I just can't help but feel excited for tonight. It's fucking Wrestlemania. It's the time when the bad build gets almost completely forgotten, and we can all jut sit back and enjoy what we watch. Even if there's been a relatively bad build for Mania, as has been the case for this year- nobody can deny that regardless of build Wrestlemania's almost always deliver. There's a LOT of matches to predict, as far as I can tell just to have made my job of doing the Unbookables Wrestlemania I put up earlier in the week a lot harder- so let's just dive right in.

Pre-Show: Team Total Divas v Team BAD & Blonde
I'm going to try and predict the order of the PPV, without really trying- but when it comes to the Pre-Show I've got absolutely no idea how they're going to structure it. Mainly because, they probably don't either. Up until a few days ago the Battle Royal was meant to be in 1 Hour of the Pre-Show on the USA Network, but now that's on the Main Card (for a reason I'll discuss later) I have no fucking clue what's happening.

There's two possibilities for this match, which is one more than there was this time last week. Either, they give Brie Bella a "Wrestlemania Moment" complete with a lot of "Yes-ing" to send her riding off into the sunset- which is quite likely. However as a result of the best Diva in history returning on RAW in Eva Marie, in my opinion there's now a chance all of the Total Divas turn on her leaving her to be killed by Tamina's Superkick, Lana's Kicks etc. to give a kayfabe reason as to why she's not on the Main Roster Post-Mania and goes back down to NXT. I don't think that's as likely as the first option- but it's one that has to be considered. Add to that, the likelihood that Brie retiring will be the Total Divas Finale- and it's quite clear what'll happen in my opinion.
Winner: Team Total Divas

Pre-Show: The Usos v The Dudleys
I won't lie, I'd almost completely forgotten this match was happening until I looked up the card in preparation for these Predictions. Unless I'm mistaken this feud didn't even get an actual spot on RAW in which to finalise the build- so the whole "look strong on the Go-Home means they're losing" train of thought doesn't exactly apply here. This is one of the (quite a few) matches that could trip up my Predictions, not because of a great build which has you questioning everything about your existence- but basically because there hasn't been a proper build. If I had to take a guess, it would be The Usos winning and then putting both Dudleys through Tables- but I honestly have no fucking clue.
Winner: The Usos

Pre-Show: Ryback v Kalisto- US Title
I have no idea if the USA Network Pre-Show thing is still happening now the Battle Royal's on the Main Show- however, if it is I'm assuming this is the match that'll take place on it. What with it being a Title match and all. I'm working on the basis that this is going to be the USA Network match- but I'm not even sure that really helps me in determining the outcome of the match. On the one hand, having a Babyface win on the Pre-Show is basically a given nine times out of then- and then on the other they may want to kick off Mania with a "bang" and have a Title change. I'm going with the Title change, just because I think 3 out of 3 Babyface wins on the Pre-Show is a bit overkill among other reasons.
Winner: Ryback

Kevin Owens v Sami Zayn v Zack Ryder v Stardust v Dolph Ziggler v The Miz v Sin Cara- IC Title Ladder Match
Firstly, I'm interested to see how much Sami Zayn does tonight after his brutal match with Nakamura. Just in my opinion, I can see Zayn doing a big "wipeout" spot fairly early on- and then only coming back in at the end to duel with Owens over the Title. It's weird, checking the Bookies- and judging by the Odds there's been a fair few bets on Zack Ryder to win the thing basing it off the fact he's the favourite. Why? I have absolutely no clue.

It's between Zayn and Owens for the Title, and only Zayn and Owens. Ryder's only in the match because Neville forgot which way his Ankle was meant to face. I really wouldn't mind either of these two winning, and they truly are destined to fight forever. However, with it seemingly being likely that Samoa Joe's being called up after how Takeover ended- it makes sense for Joe to come up after Owens in my opinion and as such.
Winner: Kevin Owens

Let me just quickly say, I'd love it if Zack Ryder won. But, it would be some turnaround for him to not even be in the original match and then win the fucking Title.

Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal
Something big is happening in this for it to be moved to the Main Card. I've seen names as varied as Samoa Joe, Strowman, Bray and Cena for the return/winner as peoples "predicted" reason as to why it was moved to the Main Card. Cena would definitely legitimise the Battle Royal, but I just don't see it personally. The Wyatts don't have enough name value to have warranted a move. I'd say Joe's more likely to show up tomorrow and instantly start a feud. I've got two Predictions for the Battle Royal Winner, the first is a return- and the second is someone already in the match.

I'll start with the one already in the match, Mark Henry. No, really. I could be wrong, because there's a lot of bullshit Wrestling "newz". But I believe Mark Henry said he'd be retiring after this Wrestlemania. As such, giving Mark a relatively big win, at Wrestlemania in his Home-State seems like a pretty apt "Thank You" for all his years of service to WWE. Likely with a HOF Induction in the near future.

Now for the return, you've probably already guessed who I'm talking about. It is of course... Scott Steiner. No, it's Cesaro who's obviously been cleared considering he's booked for the European Tour in like two weeks time- and it's a spot that's appropriate for Cesaro in the sense that it's a good spot to be featured in but it's not going to have a massive impact on the overall show. The reason I've done Mark Henry as well is of course there's no guarantee Cesaro even enters like last year when everyone was predicting Sheamus would return and win the thing.
Winner: Cesaro (and if he doesn't enter, Mark Henry)

The New Day v The League of Nations
I'll just open by saying, after their reaction last night at the HOF- this Wrestlemania Weekend in comparison to the "experience" New Day had last year is all the proof that's needed as to how just fucking good New Day have been over that year. Also, in relation to the HOF- if anyone still has doubts that Big E can be WWE Champion one day. How?

Next, I'm predicting New Day's Entrance will be the best Entrance of this years Wrestlemania barring perhaps The Undertaker. New Day deserve to have an absolutely massive Wrestlemania moment. I don't know if that would be entering on a "Katy Perry Superbowl" type Unicorn, I doubt they'd use live animals just because of how unpredictable they could be- or a million other possibilities.

Given what's been said in the build to the match in regard to tonight supposedly being a massive night for New Day and it most likely "making" them, I'm actually expecting a DQ Finish followed by a run-in. New Day win by DQ- with the League of Nations absolutely battering them and then... The Rock's Music hits. This is the first of a couple of Rock appearances for tonight, and New Day will fight back with The Rock and eventually the segment will close with Rock dancing with New Day.

I know they had the little back and forth thing earlier in the year, but New Day weren't put there by accident. As I'll discuss later, I'm expecting them to kick-off an angle for The Rock to wrestle at 33 in most likely his last match- which will of course be in Florida. But for this segment, Rock's just here to have fun and put his "stamp of approval" on New Day.
Winner: New Day

Sasha Banks v Charlotte v Becky Lynch- Divas Title
As I said during the RAW Review, this is one of- if not the best built match heading into Mania. I believe they will, but I'm just hoping these three get around 12-15 Minutes to properly tell a story and get the crowd emotionally invested in the match. They already are with the characters, but it means nothing if the crowd goes dead once the match gets going. Like I said though, I don't think that'll happen.

You could make a case for all three Women winning the match tonight, and not in the same way you can for the Kalisto match, Usos match etc. The build has just been that good. Sasha Banks is, Sasha Banks- and I'm sure the vast majority of people will be wanting (and expecting) Sasha to win tonight- and I do believe she will. However, both Charlotte- and especially Becky have equal if not better claims on the Title than Sasha in my opinion. As I said on Monday, Sasha winning tonight is likely- however within the context of the story that's been told over the last few months I'd say Becky Lynch winning makes more sense. I do believe Sasha will win, I want Becky to win, and primarily I'm just looking forward to these three being able to do their thing at Wrestlemania.
Winner: Sasha Banks

Brock Lesnar v Dean Ambrose- No Holds Barred Street Fight
If you read these Predictions regularly, you'll know with how I lay these out that I'm predicting that Brock will win. Why? Because Balor stole Ambrose's fucking Chainsaw. But seriously, as with the previous match you can make an argument for both guys involved to win the match- and it's not exactly a surprise to say I really like Ambrose. But Brock Lesnar is Brock fucking Lesnar. Ambrose is on his best run in WWE by far at the moment- but Ambrose (unless WWE drastically change their mentality) will never be an absolute elite tier "superstar". I think Ambrose is going to have one helluva showing tonight, and this match has massive "steal the show" potential. I just can't see WWE having Ambrose beat Brock.

There is of course a chance The Wyatts/Bray Wyatt interfere in the match and target Brock resulting in Ambrose winning. That has to be considering without a doubt, but I personally can't see it. Therefore...
Winner: Brock Lesnar

AJ Styles v Chris Jericho
This is pretty much the easiest match to predict on the whole card. I know Jericho's supposedly hanging around after Mania, but there's no chance Styles doesn't win in his first Wrestlemania. I don't know if it'll be with the Styles Clash, Calf Killer- or perhaps even Spiral Tap- but Styles is winning.
Winner: AJ Styles

I mean, look at this

Have you seen anyone more ready for Wrestlemania? Didn't think so.

Roman Reigns v Triple H- WWE Title
I suppose in-terms of the order of the card, this is the one prediction that is actually important. I've gone back and forth on this one in my head quite a few times, and I even had a conversation with someone on Twitter where I said this would be going on last. However, here we are. It's funny actually, I've largely ignored the "dirtsheets" over the last few months because most of it's just fabricated bullshit, or stuff taken off of r/SquaredCircle. I did see Alvarez say the Hell in a Cell is going on last as of (I think) Thursday. None of that is why I'm predicting this match won't go on last.

I'm predicting this match won't go on last, because Triple H knows exactly what it's like to go out for a Main Event when the crowd has been completely emotionally exhausted by a previous match. Shane/Undertaker is going to have everything and kitchen sink involved. There'll be weapons, interference, Tombstone Kick-Outs, very high high-spots and more with a crowd massively involved in the match. Reigns/Triple H just can't stack up to it.

I said Jericho/Styles was the easiest match to predict, but this match isn't that far behind. There's just a small voice in the back of my head that says Triple H might retain the Title and drop it to Rollins at Summerslam because of how badly they've fucked up Romans build for this Wrestlemania (again). Like I said though, it is a small voice- and no doubt after kicking out of multiple Pedigrees, Sledgehammer shots etc. Roman Reigns will be our new WWE Champion.
Winner: Roman Reigns

This is the match where I'd also expect The Rock to re-surface, with there being likely interference on the part of Triple H during the match- from whom I'm not entirely certain. I'd expect a Rock run-in to help Roman- and in-turn spark the angle for Mania 33 where he'll either be wrestling Triple H as they wanted to do this year. Or, wrestle and put over Roman. That would be accomplished by Roman obviously winning, and then with Rock raising his arm Roman decides he doesn't want to share the spotlight with anyone and attacks him- officially turning him Heel. The "sharing the spotlight" type angle would also be where I'd go for Roman's first Title feud- which as you've probably guessed would be Ambrose.

The Undertaker v Shane McMahon- Hell in a Cell
This is a match that can truly go either, and I think it completely hinges on interference and on who's behalf they're interfering. So I think it's best if I just run through the three main possibilities (in my opinion).

Balor Club- Especially with Balor not being on the NXT TV Tapings (although that could well be a troll like Owens appearing with the Belt for the post Summerslam Tapings) I think the chances of the Balor Club interfering in the Main Event is massive.

The Wyatts- They've got much less of a chance, but there's always a possibility they re-commence the Wyatt/Taker feud. The Wyatts will be showing up at some point tonight, I think that's not exactly hard to predict. Their most likely destination is Ambrose/Lesnar, but it's not locked in.

John Cena- I saw Cena say he's cleared to wrestle the other day, and with Cena/Taker being likely for Mania 33- there's a chance Cena interferes in this match and takes out Taker. That would of course have a double meaning with it being well known that Cena is a "company, and in turn Vince guy".

This match should be really good, and they're going to smoke and mirrors the shit out of it to make Shane's limitations as absent as possible. I'm just simply really looking forward to this match and all of the crazy shit that'll take place. I don't really care who wins the match, I just want to sit back and enjoy it.

With that said, I do believe Taker will win- but I'll happily be proven wrong and have Shane around as a permanent fixture of the WWE for a little while yet. There's no chance this is Taker's last Mania regardless of if he loses, because simply put- they haven't done Taker/Cena yet. Taker's last match won't be against Shane unless he's medically unable to compete past this Mania.
Winner: The Undertaker

We've got the Predictions in the bag, and I hope you've enjoyed reading through them and even if you disagree with my predicted winners I've managed to convey my thought process behind said predictions. As I said in my Takeover Review yesterday, let's not bury Wrestlemania before it's even happened. If we go in with an open mind, hoping to be entertained like Wrestlemania's almost always do I think the doubters of this Mania will come out the other side pleasantly surprised.

Thanks for reading as always, if Wrestlemania does in fact need to be buried- it will be done so on here tomorrow for the Wrestlemania Review. I hope you're back here tomorrow for the Review and you'll be tagging along on Twitter tonight. Thanks again for reading, I hope you've enjoyed all the Posts that have been put up thus far and let's get excited guys! IT'S FUCKING WRESTLEMANIA!