NXT JUNE 13TH 2018
War Raiders vs. Ricky Martinez and Justin Storm
Squash win for War Raiders, pinning Martinez after the Fallout. Crowd were into them here.
War Raiders called out Miller and Thorne after the match, saying they’d show them mighty, before giving Storm a rather scary pop up powerslam.
O’Reilly was shown warming up and being psyched up by the rest of Undisputed Era, until they noticed the camera and Cole shooed them off, telling the cameraman that he didn’t film them unless he said so. To be fair, it probably takes Cole a lot of time to set up their little arch.
Hype video for Ciampa against Gargano.
EC3 vs. Kassius Ohno
This stemmed from EC3 ‘disrespecting’ Ohno last week. Ohno started out hot as a result and took a lot of the match, in between a brief bit of control for EC3. EC3 would run Ohno’s throat into the top rope and hit the One Percenter though, pretty much out of nowhere, for the win. I don’t think EC3 has fully hit stride on NXT yet. This was his best match since coming back, ladder match aside, but kinda by default and he was on defence for most of it. , I’m hoping a meaningful feud to get his teeth into will change all of that.
Bianca Belair vs. Aliyah
Every time Aliyah appears, I have to check two things. First, is she a heel or a face and second, was she a heel or a face last time she showed up. I’m pretty sure that last time, three months ago, she was a face and I’m pretty sure here, she wasn’t. Belair, who I’m pretty sure is a heel too, got to look really good here and won with a torture rack into a sitout facebuster. I’ve noticed she seems to be saving the hair whip in recent appearances and that’s fine, because she’s getting the reactions without it now.
Hype video for Baszler against Nikki Cross.
Cathy interviewed Dakota about almost defeating Shayna last week two weeks ago and asking what she’d have changed having watched it back. Dakota said she was happy to have just had the opportunity to stand up to Shayna and if she got a second chance, the outcome could be completely different and maybe she needed to adopt some of Nikki Cross’s crazy. Bianca interrupted, saying she was the one who should be being interviewed after what she did out there. She told Dakota to fall back to the back of the line, but Dakota said she wasn’t going to let Bianca play mind games like Shayna and challenged her to a match next week.
WWE UNITED KINGDOM CHAMPIONSHIP
Pete Dunne (c) vs. Kyle O’Reilly
Crowd seemed really, extra loud for this at the start, to the point that it sounded sweetened but you could then clearly see throughout the match that it very much wasn’t. I’m not sure why or what happened, but whatever, not a bad thing. This was the mix of mat wrestling, striking and joint manipulation you’d expect, but worked at a hectic pace the whole way through. They got a standing ovation after one strike exchange, which tells you what kind of match this was and what kind of crowd it was as well. It was back and forth all the way too, with Dunne eventually winning after O’Reilly took his mouth guard out for a strike, but Dunne snapped the fingers and hit the Bitter End. Considering this was announced on Youtube after last week’s show, this really came out of nowhere in terms of the kind of match and kind of reaction it was and got.
Strong and Cole jumped Dunne post match with Oney and Burch making the save. Dunne and Cole brawled off, leaving Oney and Burch to clear the ring of Strong and O’Reilly as a teaser for the Tag Title match at Takeover.
Black came out to close, to address Lars. Black admitted that Lars catching the Black Mass a couple of weeks ago rattled him, but he’d feel the full force of it at Takeover and fade to black. Lars interrupted and Black met him with strikes as he slid into the ring, but Lars cut him off with a clothesline and hit the Freak Accident. Lars would hit two more, then carried Black and the title to the announce table and posed with the belt on top of it. This really doesn’t feel like a Takeover feud and certainly not a Takeover main event, which it probably won’t be anyway. I’m interested to see how the match goes though, since it’s a real test for both guys to deliver.
RECOMMENDED VIEWING: O’Reilly against Dunne is a clear standout NXT TV match that really caught me by surprise and is a definite must see. Belair’s performance against Aliyah was strong as well. The rest of the show was pretty standard fare.
NXT WEEK: Dakota Kai versus Bianca Belair and War Raiders against The Mighty, in the two matches that’ll be taped before Takeover.