By Alex Cooper
Sunday night was Survivor Series, and Raw proved itself to be the ‘number one’ or ‘A’ show by capturing the win by 4 to 3. Team Red wanted to celebrate its win, and opened up Monday Night Raw with a promo segment featuring Stephanie McMahon. Triple H and Kurt Angle entered the ring and it seemed that everybody was still confused about the events of Survivor Series. After Jason Jordan requested a match, it seemed that Kurt Angle didn’t have the authority to make that match– confusing, seeing as he’s still the General Manager. Braun entered the ring and a match between JJ and Strowman was announced. I am still confused about Monday’s events – nothing has been addressed and Kurt is the one who makes matches, so this segment seemed strange.
Not much special about this promo apart from the pop Braun and HHH got on their stare down.
Promo rating – 3/10.
Finn Balor v Samoa Joe
This match appears to provide closure for these two. Balor’s selling of Joe’s moves in this match was excellent. Balor showed great athletic ability throughout the match whilst maintaining that Joe was the stronger of the two competitors. Joe’s moves looked huge throughout the match. Joe eventually caught Finn in the Coquina Clutch and won via knock out. This result was definitely the right one.
Samoa Joe looked super strong in this match and rightfully so – all his moves looked like they could have killed Finn. The pair didn’t have to do much or pull off many big moves to produce a good match. Finn rolling out of the clutch and hitting him with the stomp was really nice. Overall good match and a nice start to Monday Night Raw.
Rating: 6/10
Asuka vs Dana Brooke
Asuka coming off another victory to add to her streak from the night before, this match was sure to be another good one. After all… it’s Asuka. This match appeared to come out of nowhere, but I suppose it was fuelled by Asuka taking out Dana the week before on Raw. Asuka started dominating pretty much straight away.
I really enjoyed the slap spot and enjoyed Asuka mimicking Dana Brooke even more. Despite the match being short, Dana pleasantly surprised me in this match. She proved she is not to be overlooked as she handled herself great in this match with Asuka.
Rating: 6/10
Miz TV with Roman Reigns (and the rest of the SHIELD)
The Miz is undoubtedly one of the best people WWE has even seen on the mic. I always look forward to Miz TV because it’s just so god damn entertaining. The Miz demanding profit for the merch sales is absolutely brilliant. This entire promo had me in stitches. The way Rollins set up the tease for Roman to challenge Miz to the IC title was perfect too and the crowd bought into it massively! The SHIELD beat down the Miztourage and everybody seems to be buying into the Roman Reigns v Miz hype.
This promo was absolutely brilliant from start to finish – The Miz once again delivered and so did the SHIELD!
Rating: 8.5/10
Dean Ambrose vs Sheamus
The match seemed pretty back and forth throughout, and it made sense considering the SHIELD previously stated they want back their Raw Tag Team Championships. Ambrose’s performance was much better than it was at Survivor Series.
Back and forth distractions from Rollins and Cesaro at ringside made it quite hard to predict what was going to happen – which I enjoyed! The rolling senton was really nice also! After another distraction Ambrose hit the Dirty Deeds and picked up the win. The right result to make the SHIELD look strong following their win last night and following Miz TV.
Rating: 6.5/10
Mickie James vs Bayley vs Sasha Banks vs Alicia Fox
Following a promo of why each woman ‘deserves’ to be champion, GM Kurt Angle (who previously wasn’t allowed to set up matches) set up a match between these four girls to determine the number one contender for Alexa Bliss’ Raw Women’s Championship. It seemed back and forth for the first few minutes but a lot seemed to happen.
Paige’s music hit and the crowd went WILD. She announced that she’s back. Mandy Rose and Sonya Deville interrupted the match, as the crowd started chanting for NXT which was really nice! All three of the girls beat down Sasha, Mickie and Bayley. Paige’s return was hot and gave me goosebumps!
It then cut to a backstage segment which ended in another beat down, this time on Alexa Bliss– it appears that Sonya, Mandy and Paige are going to be heels and Alexa will be the babyface, something I can definitely buy into.
The match itself was unimpressive and nothing exciting happened, but Paige’s return saved it.
Rating: 8/10 (purely for Paige’s return).
Braun Strowman vs Jason Jordan
As previously announced, and after multiple backstage segments of JJ saying he’d hurt his knee, I was really expecting Braun to work his leg more in this match. Braun dominated as per usual, but JJ came across as more of a heel in this match by walking off. Kane’s interruption being right on cue made me wonder if in the future we will see an alliance between JJ and Kane, or even perhaps if JJ is the man ‘controlling’ Kane. Either way, Kane hit Braun in the throat with a steel chair and it was awesome. Braun sold it perfectly and refusing the help whilst nearly choking to death made Strowman look even more badass than he already is.
Mustafa Ali, Rich Swann, and Cedric Alexander vs Drew Gulak, Tony Nese, Ariya Daivari, and Noam Dar
Next came out cruiserweight champion Enzo Amore and his cronies. A
big brawl started out between the cruiserweight division and it ended up setting up an 8 man tag. Enzo giving grief on the outside of the ring was comedy gold; the match itself however was pretty boring. That being said, with 8 men in a 6/7 minute match, it was probably the best they could do. The match ended with Ali hitting the Imploding 450 on Noam Dar and picking up the win.
Rating: 3/10
Elias & Matt Hardy Segment
This feud has pretty much come out of nowhere; Elias came out singing and was interrupted by Matt Hardy, who beat down Elias. Before Matt Hardy could hit the Twist of Fate, Elias bailed out of the ring. This sets up nicely for next time if something is to happen next week.
Rating: 5/10
Roman Reigns vs The Miz
Throughout this match, both men played to their strengths. The Miz proved yet again why he is one of the best heels the WWE has ever seen with his bailing. I also marked out for the fact that the Miz had on Daniel Bryan coloured gear and did the ‘yes’ kicks. Maybe it was just me that clocked on to that. Sheamus and Cesaro caused a distraction towards the end of the match meaning The Miz could hit his Skull Crushing Finale and put Reigns away for good. However Reigns obviously kicked out. This was then followed by Ambrose and Rollins arriving at ringside to take out the tag team champions. Finally, Reigns hit the Miz with the spear for the win and became the new Intercontinental Champion.
Unlike most others, I can really get behind this. If Rollins and Ambrose become tag team champions again, it really sets the mark of the SHIELD being this dominant force – something which I am a mark for. The Miz gave the Intercontinental Championship back its prestige, and I have no doubt that with Roman Reigns (like it or not) being the face of the WWE, it will keep its prestige. Whilst some people may not like that it happened ‘too suddenly’ or that there was no real build up – in my opinion, this makes it better. For too long people have complained that WWE is predictable, winning a title without a build-up makes it less so. I also hope this means bigger things for The Miz. He deserves it.
Rating: 7/10
Alex Cooper is a regular contributor to a number of Official Wrestling podcasts, including A Few Good Marks. She enjoys winning gold belts, putting metal studs on everything and gorping at pictures of Roman Reigns.
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