Monday Night Raw | A night of Returns | WELCOME BACK ROMAN! |

Roman Reigns returned to the WWE to a fantastic reception since October. Chants of Welcome Back were heard, This is your Yard. He thanked everyone for the messages of support via social media. He announced during the promo that he is now in remission which is amazing news! Seth walks out to congratulate the big dog. 

After the segment and throughout the show, I saw people on social media claiming to be "doctors" talking about Reigns' illness was a "work" I say to them to click on the link HERE, you might learn something. educate yourself before making pointless assumptions.

NXT stars Aleister Black and Ricochet defeated RAW tag champions Revival via the Black Mass kick. 

It looks like they are going to push Lacey Evans for a big match at Wrestlemania (vs. Asuka for the SmackDown women's championship) she did the usual walking out to the arena and walking back to the backstage.  

That's getting boring to watch, Ambrose challenged McIntyre to a no DQ match. Prior to hitting Elias with Dirty Deeds. 

The tag match between Riott Squad vs. Natalya and Ronda Rousey didn't have a decisive winner after "The Man" interrupted and hit Natalya and others prior to being arrested. This was reminiscent of Stone Cold Steve Austin in the WWF days. 

Ronda called out Vince but got Stephanie instead, stating she wants Becky in the match at 'Mania but that proposal was predictably turned down. Ronda issued a ultimatum to Vince and dropped the title and walked away. 

Phase one of Ronda leaving the company has begun here. 

I'm just going skip past the Mahal Angle match. No surprises to see who won. Finn Balor defeated Lio Rush to remain intercontinental champion. 

Drew McIntyre defeated Dean Ambrose thanks to an assist from Elias's guitar leading to the Claymore kick for the win. Lashley and Corbin walked out to help the other heels in the ring take out Ambrose until Rollins and Reigns walked out to fight the heels and standing tall after. 

It was interesting to see they left Ambrose in the ring. I sense a final Shield reunion is on the cards. Which would be awesome. 

Bayley defeated Nia Jax in the final match of the night to continue the build up to Fastlane. 

And finally we move on the to Ric Flairs celebration, we saw Hall of Famers: Shawn Michaels, Ricky Steamboat, Kurt Angle and Sting join the party, with the main roster stood on the entrance way. 

When Flair was introduced and he didn't walk out, I thought Becky attacked him, but it turned out to be Batista who then asked Triple H if he had his attention now. 

Batista v Triple H at Wrestlemania is a certainty, hopefully it has a great build up in the weeks leading up the match. 

So there you have it. An impromptu review of Raw. I never planned on writing up on this weeks episode but I'm happy I did because this was good to watch.

I'll be posting my predictions for Fastlane next week. Enjoy Smackdown and NXT also if you're watching. 

Thanks for reading. 

Raw and SmackDown | Review

RAW Review - LIVE from Lafayette, Louisiana.

Triple H opened the show talking about Becky interfering at the Elimination Chamber event, he thought it was pretty cool, I'm not surprised by that comment considering Triple H himself used to interfere in matches where he didn't need to. 

He mentioned DX were being inducted in the Hall of Fame (aka the WWE website) 

We know that he is in charge of running NXT. so it was a matter of time till superstars from that brand were being called down to the main roster. 

They were Ricochet, Aleister Black, Johnny Gargano and Tommaso Ciampa. Four of the best on the NXT roster, I hope the WWE writers are creative with there future stories. I'm just going to skip through the next match: Braun Strowman v Baron Corbin in a tables match. (Seriously, who cares?) 

Following that match Paul Heyman walked out and cut a standard promo about Brock etc, this match vs Seth Rollins is a long way away from taking place, so I didn't pay attention to what was said. I guess Bobby Lashley and Lio Rush aren't broken up at all but they lost to the debuting Ricochet and Finn Balor, who make a excellent tag team, I want to see them fight for the intercontinental championship. They would bring the house down. 

Drew McIntyre defeated Dean Ambrose with the Claymore kick, nothing else to say about that, Aleister Black didn't walk with Elias, he won his match instead. Sasha and Bayley look like they will defend the tag titles at Fastlane in a few weeks time. 

Am I forgetting somethings? Yeah, you could say that, the NXT guys continued to impress as Gargano and Ciampo took the win against tag champs, the Revival. The crowd were so quiet in Lafayette, that was bad to see. The atmosphere made the matches seem so average. 

Your main event was Ronda Rousey putting her RAW women's championship on the line against Ruby Riott, this was a much more competitive match between the two than the one on Sunday. Which was won by Ronda Rousey via a impressive roll through into an Armbar to end the show. 

Lets talk about SmackDown. LIVE from New Orleans. 

Shane o'Mac followed in his brother in laws footsteps by opening the show, introducing the same NXT talent that was showcased on RAW. Miz interrupted him and admitted he used Shane and then went on to talk about the past leading up to this segment. 

The Usos were next out and the rematch for Fastlane was made. The breakup of the Shane and Miz will 100% happen at that event.

Aleister Black defeated Andrade in a match that continued there rivalry from the NXT days. They put on a very good, fast paced match. These two can easily headline Wrestlemania one day. 

Up next was: The Bar vs. Johnny Gargano and Tommaso Ciampa.

SmackDown was raising the bar (no pun intended) with the matches here tonight, Gargano and Ciampa picked up the win after a decent tag team match, if it was at a  pay-per-view this would get more time. 

Asuka was finally back on TV, later defeated by Mandy Rose in a "shock" win. That will probably get the victor a title match at Fastlane or at Wrestlemania in her hometown. 

Hey look! Sanity were finally back on tv, albeit in singles competition. They didn't even get an entrance on this episode, probably due to time constraints. Ricochet defeated Eric Young via the 630 splash. 

In the main event: Kofi Kingston, Jeff Hardy and AJ Styles defeated Samoa Joe, Randy Orton and Daniel Bryan after Kingston pinned Bryan after hitting Trouble in Paradise. Shane announced that it will be Daniel Bryan defending the WWE championship at Fastlane as SmackDown went off the air.

That wraps up the RAW and SmackDown reviews. I'll be back in a couple of weeks to predict the winners for Fastlane. Thanks for reading. 

Elimination Chamber | Review

It's now time to look back at, what turned out to be a very good Elimination Chamber event so let's begin!

Match 1: Women's Tag Team Championship (Elimination Chamber): Sasha Banks & Bayley vs. Nia Jax & Tamina vs. Riott Squad vs. The IIconics vs. Mandy Rose & Sonya Deville vs. Naomi & Carmella

It was a slow start to the match, Naomi and Carmella were the first ones eliminated by the IIconics, 

who were surprisingly impressive. 

The match picked up soon after, with the usual high spots and tag team tandem resulting in Sasha Banks and Bayley winning the WWE Women's tag team championships. Well deserved because they were poorly booked by the WWE creative team last year. 

Match 2: SmackDown Tag Team Championship: The Miz & Shane McMahon (c) vs. The Usos

Your usual tag match here, Shane did the usual coast to coast spots and elbow drops from the top rope, which are getting ridiculously boring to see nowadays to be honest with you. 

Jimmy Uso rolled up the Miz to pick up the win for him and his brother Jey and become the NEW SmackDown tag team champions. It looks like this is the start of the break up of Shane and Miz. 

Match 3: Intercontinental Championship: Bobby Lashley (c) & Lio Rush 

Now, before this match there was a backstage interview with Bobby Lashley and Lio Rush, they were asked if they were worried about losing the Intercontinental title because of other champions crowned during the night. 

I don't know about you, but to me that felt like it was a spoiler that Finn was winning the title here, and that proved to be the case.

Match 4: Raw Women's Championship: Ronda Rousey (c) vs. Ruby Riott

(Charlotte Flair at Ringside) 

This was a surprisingly quick match, Rousey was always going to win here. It was all about the Wrestlemania main event being built up a step further with "The Man" making another appearance despite being "suspended" she sold her "injury" really well by taking out Flair and Ronda here with crutches.

We are still a while away from Wrestlemania, WWE need to cool down the build for a few weeks to maintain the fans interest so the storyline doesn't get boring before April.

Match 5: Baron Corbin v Braun Strowman (No Disqualification) 

I missed the majority of this one because of the lack of interest I had in wanting to watch this matchup. I guess McIntyre, Corbin and Lashley are back on the same team again. 

Corbin won this one after Strowman was put through tables via a triple powerbomb. This kinda me reminded of The Shield.

I wanted this feud to be over, but it looks like it's going to continue (unfortunately) 

Match 6: WWE Championship (Elimination Chamber): Daniel Bryan (c) vs. AJ Styles vs. Randy Orton vs. Samoa Joe vs. Jeff Hardy vs. Kofi Kingston

A fun main event from start to finish, It looks like we are set to see Aj Styles vs. Randy Orton later down the line after Styles was eliminated by the viper thanks to a top rope RKO. 

The crowd was fully behind Kofi here, the way the match was going, there was a sense that he was going to win the title for the first time, but it wasn't to be as Bryan won and remains your WWE champion. 

Another superb performance by Kofi here, it's a shame that he didn't win here, hopefully he'll get an other opportunity in the future because he deserves it. 

Elimination Chamber is now in the past as we are now on the FASTLANE to Wrestlemania! 

Elimination Chamber | Preview and Predictions

The Elimination Chamber is this Sunday night (Monday morning here in the UK) its now time to predict the winners from the following matches.

Cruiserweight Championship: Buddy Murphy (c) vs. Akira Tozawa

I believe this contest scheduled for one fall (one fall) is on the Kick-Off show. To be honest with you, I haven’t been following this storyline, if there is one, on 205 Live.

Winner: and still champion. Buddy Murphy.

Braun Strowman vs. Baron Corbin

I don’t care about this match, it’s dull and uninteresting. Here is your winner: Braun Strowman.

SmackDown Tag Team Championship: The Miz & Shane McMahon (c) vs. The Usos

I believe the Miz and Shane friendship is coming to an end and this match is the start of the tag team’s demise leading up to a match between the two at WrestleMania. I feel there will be some sort of mis-communication and the Uso’s will take advantage and pick up the win here.

Winners: AND NEW SmackDown Tag Team Champions! The Uso’s

Raw Women's Championship: Ronda Rousey (c) vs. Ruby Riott

Charlotte is going to be at ringside, she will no doubt be involved in the finish and probably end up costing Ruby Riott instead of Ronda.

Winner: and STILL Raw Women’s Champion: Ronda Rousey.

Intercontinental Championship: Bobby Lashley (c) & Lio Rush 

vs. Finn Balor

Winners: Bobby Lashley and Lio Rush.

This story will continue up to WrestleMania ending with Finn Balor finally winning the Intercontinental Championship.

Women's Tag Team Championship (Elimination Chamber): Sasha Banks & Bayley vs. Nia Jax & Tamina vs. Riott Squad vs. The IIconics vs. Mandy Rose & Sonya Deville vs. Naomi & Carmella

For me it’s a lock that Sasha and Bayley are winning this match, The tag titles are made for them, I’m sure this will be a very good match.

Winners: your Women’s Tag Team Champions: Sasha Banks and Bayley.

Staying with Sasha and Bayley for a second here, I’ve read reports that the Total Bellas show rating is declining per episode, which leads me to think Nikki and Brie are going to be back on TV soon and are going to be facing Sasha and Bayley at ‘Mania. I don’t want to see the Bella Twins having a tag title match, I’m sure you don’t either.

WWE Championship (Elimination Chamber): Daniel Bryan (c) vs. AJ Styles vs. Randy Orton vs. Samoa Joe vs. Jeff Hardy vs. Kofi Kingston

First of all....A superb performance from Kofi Kingston on Smackdown during the Gauntlet match which was won by Randy Orton, lastly eliminating AJ Styles to become the last participant to enter the Chamber match on Sunday.

A Kofi Kingston win here would be great; he has been in the WWE for many years. I say give him a short run with the title, up to Fastlane where he can lose it back to Daniel Bryan. It’s meant to be a ‘NEW ERA’ after all right? Here is my pick for this match overall.

Winner: and still WWE Champion. Daniel Bryan.

That wraps up the Elimination Chamber predictions. Not sure how many I’ll get correct. But we will find out. The review of this event will be up on this here blog on Monday during the day. 

Thanks for reading. 

Smackdown LIVE | Review

Smackdown LIVE was LIVE (obviously) from Phoenix, Arizona 

We began the show with "The Man Becky Lynch talking about her Royal Rumble win, same as Seth Rollins on Raw the previous night. It's standard wrestling logic that says when a face starts a promo it's "natural " that he or she is interrupted and vice versa, an example being Charlotte here, interrupting Lynch and taking credit for her success. (No this isn't a review of RAW again) ending with a brawl. I think there will be another match in one of the two pay-per-views. 

Up next was Shinsuke Nakamura defending his newly won US championship against R-Truth who was rewarded a shot of the title after missing out on the Rumble match, the referee botched the three count and Truth was announced as the winner, I was waiting for an "authority figure" (because there's not a lot of those around in wrestling these days) to restart the match, that wasn't the case, Rusev appeared and wanted a match for the title, the champion said no. Rusev and Shinsuke beat up Truth. 

Becky is seen limping whilst walking, claiming she is not injured, interesting to see where this storyline is headed. 

Rey Mysterio v Samoa Joe never happened after Andrade attacked Rey, laying him out with a hammerlock DDT. Looks like this one is perhaps headed to Wrestlemania, the two always have entertaining matches, so it's all good. 

Miz and Shane held a tag title celebration, we saw Miz's dad in this segment, later Shane announced a four corner tag match: Usos v New Day v Bar v Heavy Machinery. Which was won by the Usos. The brothers will face the champions at Elimination Chamber. Could there be new tag team champions crowned? Maybe....

Daniel Bryan started off the "main event" promo by introducing Rowan, he then threw the WWE Championship in the bin, thus unveiling of a new look championship, I believe it's a hemp type belt but at first glance it looks like another women's championship. Skipping ahead a little here, Triple H announced that Bryan will defend the title at the Elimination Chamber against AJ Styles, Randy Orton, Samoa Joe, Jeff Hardy and Mustafa Ali. A brawl between the five guys in the ring ended the show.

I'm happy I've decided to write about Raw and Smackdown after an event has taken place on a Sunday, I sense that we will see repetitive matches and segments in the coming weeks where if you missed a week or two of these shows, you won't really miss much. It's been like this for a very long time and it won't change. 

I'll be back for the next pay-per-view event with predictions. Thanks for reading. 

Monday night RAW | Review

Let's talk about Monday night RAW,  which was broadcast LIVE from Phoenix Arizona.

Seth Rollins opened the show talking about winning the Royal Rumble the night before, the usual stuff we, the viewers, hear after every Rumble, including pointing at the Wrestlemania sign, something that's probably going to be done on every Raw, Smackdown (pay-per-views included) til April.

Triple H comes out, gets a nice reception from the crowd, see what happens when you don't appear on TV every week? You get cheered. He bigs up Rollins and then Ambrose intervenes, the past is talked about, Ambrose goads Triple H to make the match between him and Rollins or does he have to ask Vince's permission. 

The match is made. Seth won the back and forth match with a stomp to Ambrose, back from the commercial, Ambrose is still in the ring. All of a sudden interrupted by Nia Jax and Tamina. I like that they are having Nia interact with the guys in the ring after all, she's not like most girls as it says in her theme song. Her getting Dean out of the ring is interesting, could they be building to some sort of match between these two? I kinda wanna see that to be honest. 

Nia and Tamina went on to defeat Alexa and Mickie via a impressive double Samoan Drop from Nia to advance to the next round. Next we see a battle of two former General Managers. Kurt Angle was beaten clean by Corbin. The Olympian looks so out of it now, he needs to retire. I think they are building to that story. Perhaps ending at Wrestlemania. 

Other things that happened were, Finn Balor beaten up by Lashley and his "hype-man"  Lio Rush. The Revival defeated Hawkins and Ryder via the Shatter Machine. If your wondering why we are seeing a lot of the lesser talent on tv. The words AEW might have something to do with it, that is all I'm going say about that.

Elias is now back to being a heel, taking out Jeff Jarrett and Road Dogg with the Guitar. Natalya and Dana Brooke were defeated by Liv Morgan and Sarah Logan, I missed this match to be honest, I'm not surprised that the heels won this one. 

Ronda Rousey's open challenge was accepted by Bailey, interesting to see the crowd so against Ronda, probably because of her 'mania opponent. Ronda won that via the arm-bar. "The Man" interrupted and chose the champion for the main event in April. 

Braun Strowman v Drew McIntyre ended in a DQ. This part of the show, ended with Corbin and McIntyre laying out Strowman. So much for the new era, it's more like new year, same story. 

The main event promo was all about Rollins making a decision about who he was to face at Wrestlemania, Brock or Daniel Bryan. We never got to that as Brock gave Rollins F5 after F5 after F5 and more to end the show. 

Wrestlemania is a long time away, so there is no rush for Rollins to make a decision as to who he is going to face for the respective titles. Did I enjoy the show? Some parts yes, some no. I struggled to keep paying attention in the second half of the show, I deserve a WWE championship of my own for watching this 3 hour show show every week. Smackdown included. 

Click HERE for my thoughts on Smackdown. 

Royal Rumble 2019 Review |

The much anticipated Royal Rumble is in the books. Time to look back at the event starting with the kick off show. 

Shinsuke Nakamura won back the US championship from Rusev after Rusev collided with Lana, sending her off the ring apron to the floor, decent match overall.

Missed the majority of the next two matches to be honest so let's get to the main card. 

Starting off with the Smackdown women's championship match. Asuka going one on one against "The Man" Becky Lynch. 

It's great for Asuka that she remained champion by forcing Lynch tap out in a back and forth match, it also made things a whole lot clearer as to who was going to win the women's rumble later on in the show. 

Staying with the Smackdown brand, The Miz and Shane captured the tag titles from the bar in a very entertaining match. Let's see how long that reign lasts, I give it until fastlane. 

A match I was looking forward to delivered, Sasha and Ronda put on a action packed match. I thought the champion was going to tap but she managed to get out of that dilemma, in the end Banks tapped out. Ronda moves on to her next challenger and Sasha will attempt to move on also, probably to focus on the tag titles at the Elimination Chamber. 

The Women's Rumble match featured Pay-per-view debuts for Lacey Evans, Nikki Cross and other NXT talent, I picked number 20 Who turned out to be Zelina Vega. She hid under the ring for a while, sound strategy if you can make it work. 

When Lana walked out at number 28 injured, it became obvious that Becky was going to take her spot, the final two came down to Becky and Charlotte with "The Man" prevailing. 

Interesting to see what they do with Charlotte, I still stand by my prediction that the main event of Wrestlemania will be a triple threat match between Becky v Ronda v Charlotte. 

Going to quickly talk about the two WWE championship matches starting with Bryan v AJ. I had AJ to win this match up but it wasn't to be after numerous attempts to tap Bryan out, Erick Rowan returned to help the champion win the match. 

Rowan is obviously going to be Bryan's "heavy" I wonder if they'll mention Bryan's affiliation with the Wyatt family in the past. This match was slow and felt boring, go look back at the crowds reaction to this match or the lack of it. The women's rumble had something to do with it.

Ok, on to the Brock Lesnar v Finn Balor Match. Balor put on a great effort, attacking the beast from the get go, going after him after Lesnar hurt himself via the announce table, For me, Balor had it won but, one moment of lapse of concentration and the Kimora lock was applied, Balor tapped out right away. 

On to the main event, which lacked surprises besides NXT's Johnny Gargano and Aleister Black putting on a good show, the match was lacking some fire and became slow in my opinion because how long the event itself was, McIntyre was eliminated with Seth still in. I'm kind of getting tired of Kofi's escape scenarios, it's played out now I'm sorry. 

We knew R Truth wouldn't make it to the ring despite being the last entrant but I, like many didn't expect what happened next.

Nia Jax attacked him and took his number 30 spot, eliminating Mustafa Ali and then things picked up when that happened as I thought "they wouldn't have her win the men's match would they?" The Superkick, 619 and RKO to her was crazy prior to her elimination. Royal Rumble tend to have unexpected things happening and this was one of those examples. 

Seth Rollins eliminated Braun with a stomp to win. He will go on to "BURN IT DOWN" at Wrestlemania whether it's against Lesnar OR Bryan time will tell. 

Overall this event was a 6 out of 10. My only gripe with this is that the show was so long. 5 hours. 7 if you count the kick off show. I'm very much looking forward to the halftime heat tag team match during the big Super Bowl game on Sunday. 

All eyes turn to Raw tomorrow night. (Morning if you're in the UK like me) I'm going to a write a one-off blog review for Raw and Smackdown over the next two nights.

Hopefully you've enjoyed reading this. Any feedback is welcome.