Doog

Pretty sure I can see Shawn Michaels chin in that instagram post

Watched this this morning as saw last night that Orton was going to be back.

The stuff involving Orton and Riddle was really good, the pairing is over and the crowd are really into it, it's been about the only thing i've enjoyed on RAW the past few months and it didn't disappoint again. The RKO at the end was perfect and Randy's expressions, its an entertaining partnership.

They have to be winning the tag titles at SummerSlam you'd assume.

Rest of the show was a waste of time.

Chelsea are a decent bet to win the league next season I'd say given how they ended last season with Tuchel, and if they can get another striker over the line.

Now that fans are back this season is a completely different beast mind, there's no way Liverpool would have lost all them home games last season if Anfield was full, not a chance. I dont think West Ham would've finished as high either, it'll change the dynamics a hell of a lot. 

The whole style of how teams play will be different with different pressures from having full crowds again, I imagine it'll revert to the usual suspects being towards the top of course, but certain managers aren't going to be able to shithouse their way through the season now there's a crowd present.

COVID is going to ruin Punk and Danielson’s debuts isn’t it, WWE already making plans to return to the Thunderdome so you’d expect AEW will end up back at Daily’s Place soon with no fans again.

Gutting if they don’t get to debut in front of the rabid AEW crowds, at least it saves Hangman’s big moment for when there will be crowds again if he is out of All Out, would’ve been a massive shame for him to win the belt there if it is moved back to Jacksonville with no fans.

Where an earth has Randy Orton gone? If I didn't know better I'd be expecting him to be released now, his dissaperance is following the same pattern of a lot of the others being released, it's really odd.

I mean Riddle still mentions him now and again and all signs seem to point towards RKBro against Styles and Omos at SummerSlam but it's been what, 6 weeks since he was last on the show now? No explanation or anything, it's bizzare.

None of the dirtsheets seem to have said anything either, aside from him being on the inactive list, you'd think his reasons for being out would have been leaked by now. So weird.

Omega/Christian as the potential All Out main event is grim as fuck. Which is mad in a way because to be fair a couple months ago when Christian first came in that would have sounded like a really good main event for the big show.

But now? After all that’s happened since? Itd feel like such a come down, I can only assume the title match isn’t going to be the main event and as someone mentioned the Bucks against Bryan and Punk will main event maybe, but I really don’t see the fans buying Omega v Christian as the main event for such a big show now.

Meltzer is reporting Page is out of the All Out main event, was originally planned apparently but now it's been changed. Interesting.

They have also apparently promised the arena that it will be over in time for fans to make it to the boxing that night as well, so with the current time it's listed to start it's only going to last about 3 hours which makes the decision to proceed on the Saturday even stranger.

That reaction for Cena was something, great to see.

Cena/Reigns is the biggest match WWE could do at this point until The Rock comes back so as a SummerSlam main event it's brilliant. Cena looked pumped up and promo wise I'm sure he and Roman will bring the goods leading up to it. Big time feel.

Big E winning was telegraphed on SmackDown so not a massive suprise but we'll see what he does with it. I'd prefer if he goes down the route of telling the champion when he's cashing in and they build up to it properly. If Roman is being primed for The Rock at Wrestlemania then you wouldn't expect he'll be losing the title before then so it'll be interesting to see if Big E ends on on RAW and goes for Lashley, would tie in with Lashley's current fued with the New Day, that's if Goldberg doesn't put a spanner in those works.

Decent enough show to set up more stuff. SummerSlam is looking decent.

Michael Cole is particularly frustrating because he can be good. I’ve been going back through RAW and Smackdown over the past year from 2003 and have now reached February 2005, and his partnership with Tazz is brilliant, they work well together and it just works.

Now he’s just a puppet for the latest buzz words or whatever and there’s literally nothing authentic about him at all, you can see why they were so intent on him replacing JR as clearly they realised they could mould him into everything they wanted, but, as above, when left to his own devices as such as I imagine he was during that SmackDown run with Tazz and soon to be JBL, he can be absolutely fine

Heartbreaking. Incredible to get this far and was a career defining tournament for many of them.

What a turn around though really; to get beat 0-0 by Scotland and still reach the final is something to be celebrated

Randy Orton not on again second week in a row, wonder where he is and what’s happened

Riddle was doing it for Orton, I know you mentioned you only read the report, but on TV they made that perfectly clear.

As poor as RAW is and has been, the Riddle/Orton team and dynamic has been really fun over the last couple months and this was another cool layer to that. Orton is just brilliant and I've warmed to Riddle a lot since he started the team with him, I imagine it's leading to them challenging for the tag titles at SummerSlam and I think they'll be a big hit with the live crowd.

Saying that, little bit concerning why Randy wasn't on RAW, usual sites don't seem to know why yet either.

Interesting - has anyone used Pluto TV before and have any idea how to access the TNA content on there? I’ve got Pluto TV on my TV but can’t find it anywhere and there doesn’t appear to be a search function.

Bank Holiday next Monday as well which makes the timing of this PPV ideal, will probably be the first PPV I stay up for since WrestleMania 35.

It looks good, last weeks Dynamite was my favourite wrestling show for a long time, plenty of promos and less wrestling which I enjoy in my weekly wrestling shows. Really good card for this one and most importantly a capacity crowd which will make watching it a lot better.

Interested to see how it looks aesthetically as the Jags stadium is a unique setting. 

I've really enjoyed Omega the last few weeks despite previously not really 'getting' him, but his match is the one im least interested in. Firstly there's been very little build to it, secondly it's obvious Omega wins and lastly PAC and moreso Cassidy are clearly not on Omega's level, as this promotion runs on and we get to the big matches, Omega is going to be working with bigger stars than them, it feels like a filler title match like WWE would do at the Royal Rumble to give someone a rub and the champion a decent win. Not that that's necessarily a bad thing if it doesnt go on last, if this match does go on last then it's a real let down.

Overall looking forward to it mind, Bucks vs Mox and Kingston is the one I am most up for, I'd expect them to get an incredible reaction from the live crowd as well. Should be decent.

25 City tour up to September 6th, then I assume back to the Thunderdome after that? Is the plan to alternate between live shows and the Thunderdome in the future?

Heyman’s tribute on talking smack was pretty poignant 

The fuck is Jeff Hardy doing pissing around on Main Event when RAW is in the state that it is?!

Where are AJ Styles and Omos? They haven't been seen or mentioned since WrestleMania. I assumed it could be something Covid related but it's bizzare they've not referenced them both at all. Haven't seen it reported anywhere what's up with them either but it's been over 2 weeks since they were last seen now.

Where do yous watch Impact these days? I’ve just tried to watch through the impact website and it just constantly buffers and skips, is there any other platforms to watch it on?

Saw something about YouTube but can’t see an episode on there

Yeah he’s definitely one of those where you can’t even just blame the WWE machine for positioning him to try and be likeable but he comes across like a dickhead. He is just a genuine unlikeable dickhead and no character or script can mask that.

Theres a decent wrestler there no doubt but fuck him, he’s a twat.

I really enjoyed the last couple of nights to be fair, canned crowd noise aside.

Actually seem to be in the minority here but I preferred night 2, could have been due to the fact I accidently saw who won a couple of the night 1 matches before watching mind wheras was completely spoiler free for night 2.

Have only watched last years SummerSlam and Royal Rumble since the pandemic started so that could also be why I enjoyed it so much, but when fans are back I'll definately be all in to start watching again. I think it's one of those where it was a habit for so long and then when you stop watching you miss it, even if it's shit, you miss that habit, so dipping in to a big event like this fills that void. I can't stand the thunderdome mind so I won't be watching again until fans are back, so I guess around SummerSlam.

I also think two night WrestleMania's are the way to go, and the fact they just said 'April 2022' for next years, despite previously advertising a date for the one night show, makes me think they're veering towards that too. It means its two 3 hour shows rather than a mammoth 6 hour show which you know they would do on one night, which is just too much, and makes a proper decent weekend out of it as well. 

As I feared they couldn’t help themselves and were still piping in crowd noise throughout a lot of the show. I was really hoping they wouldn’t do that. It’s going to be a feature forever now isn’t it

The Heyman/Edge segment on Talking Smack was sensational.

Seriously go out of your way to see it, so intense, even the Mrs who was in the room with me and has no interest stopped what she was doing to listen to it, captivating stuff.

I keep getting fairly excited about watching this with fans being back and it being WrestleMania n all, I’ve watched so little WWE since the pandemic so I know I’ll enjoy it.

But then it hits me that fans are there for this but then from RAW it’s straight back to the thunderdome until August with no fans whatsoever, so it just kills it as I know I’ll literally have no interest whatsoever once WrestleMania is over. It then feels pointless wasting 6 hours this weekend on something I’ll have no interest in to follow up until SummerSlam probably.