Fresh from Dallas on their way to London for Monday Night Raw, WWE Leeds rolled through with a fantastic show and TWM were in attendance.
The show opened with a Twitter vote for which WrestleMania 32 match we would like to see again. Undertaker vs. Shane McMahon was the clear winner and we saw a shortened version on the big screen, plenty of cheers for Shane jumping from the top of the cell, after the viewing Greg Hamilton welcomed us to WWE Leeds and told us we were in for a great show!
The first match was for the United States Championship, as Kalisto went one-on-one against Ryback. The match itself was great, Kalisto had the fans chanting “LUCHA! LUCHA!” and there was some pretty impressive moves within the match. Ryback hit a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker and managed to pick up a very close two count, but as Kalisto hit his impressive Salida Del Sol, ‘The Big Guy’ had no chance and Kalisto picked up the win.
Damien Sandow(!) came out next to personally give a heartwarming thank you to all the fans for supporting him through his career, he said that he hasn’t been on television for some time now but felt grateful that we were still so supportive of him and remembered who he was. However, we as fans sound so stupid when we “do that Fandango-ing”. We sound like idiots. Cue Fandango’s entrance as the crowd joined in ‘being idiots’ and Fandago-ed(?) him all the way to the ring. A basic match made better with Sandows’ insults being a highlight (including him shouting “You have bad teeth!”). A win for Fandango proved nothing as Sandow slithered away and back into the darkness.
An Adam Rose-less Social Outcasts were out next in the form of Heath Slater and Bo Dallas. After some interaction with Row A, the crowd erupted as R-Truth came out and rapped along with the crowd – WHAT’S UP! R-Truth vs. Bo Dallas got underway with Slater on the outside taking every opportunity to interfere. A quick roll up on Dallas led to the referee only counting to two and then calling for the bell as Dallas and Slater beatdown R-Truth. The crowd went wild as Goldusts’ music hit and he came in for the save! After a scuffle, Goldust and R-Truth were standing tall in the ring and even shook hands as they went ringside for photos and autographs with the fans.
Just before the intermission we were treated to a great tag team match up showcasing the fantastic talents of AJ Styles & Sami Zayn vs. Kevin Owens & Alberto Del Rio. This match wouldn’t have looked out of place on a Ring of Honor show, the wrestling was top class and after yelling “SHUT UP!” to the crowd, Kevin Owens was on the receiving end of a Helluva Kick from Zayn as the crowd chanted along “1,2,3!” with the referee as AJ & Sami picked up the win.
After the intermission and another plug of the WWE Leeds tour programme, were treated to an Eight Womens’ Tag Team Match, which saw Paige, Natalya, Alicia Fox and Eva Marie defeat Summer Rae, Lana, Naomi and Tamina. Not much to report apart from Eva Marie having the loudest boo’s of the night. Paige picked up the win with the Rampaige on Naomi for the homeland win.
In a surprising turn of events, the next match saw Los Matadores come out for a 2-on-1 handicap match. This is interesting as WWE have been showing vignettes of Primo and Epico as a new Puerto Rican tag team. As you can probably guess, they were up against Big Show who came out to huge cheers. Highlight of this match was Show having both men in the corner with his back to them as the crowd chanted “This is wrestling!” and Show had a giggle to himself as he repeated it. Big Show picked up the win after a double chokeslam and spent a while ringside for photos and autographs with all the fans.
Finally the main event was a triple threat for the Intercontinental Title. Miz and Maryse came out first and insisted on the crowd shutting up as Maryse tried to explain how they should be introduced. This didn’t last long as Dean Ambrose came out to the biggest cheers of the night by far. As “We Want Ryder!” chants rung out ringside, the final opponent’s music hit, and out came Dolph Ziggler. The three put on a good match to finish with. There was a lack of dives to the outside in this match and generally throughout the show. But the charisma and talent of all three Superstars showed that the current roster is quite possibly the best we’ve ever had, and with a roll-up on Ambrose (and some serious rope grabbing) The Miz picked up the win to retain his title.
After the match the referee consulted with kids ringside who were yelling that he held the ropes to win, and shortly after Miz trying to get Ambrose to shake his hand to prove he didn’t (and never ever would) cheat he was on the receiving end of a Superkick from Ziggler and Dirty Deeds from Ambrose! They cleared the ring and scurried away to leave Ziggler and Ambrose celebrating in the ring as the show came to a finish.
There was no mention of the usual November tour or any dates that they would next be in the UK but everyone seemed to leave the show happy, possibly because Roman Reigns didn’t show up! But that was WWE Leeds! A great show all in all.
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