d-d-d-dAz

There's a kebab shop on the corner right by Hammersmith Apollo that is absolutely banging (or at least used to be).

There's a Souvlaki place by Hammersmith square that's really nice.

Plus the usual; Burrito by the station, Subway by the station etc

But I used to go to the Souvlaki place by the square on my lunch break and it was superb.

Also, on Lyric Square @SuperBacon there's a place called Baba G. That's my recommendation for something quick actually.

I think the thing that will have real historical significance is the emergence of Kieran McKenna, especially against the backdrop of how he got so heavily slagged off by Man Utd dressing room leaks.

I think he's a really special coach.

Only been working here 3 months and promotion already.

Clearly I'm a lucky charm.

Still have the Coventry complement of fingers, though.

9 minutes ago, Vamp said:

Starmer hasn't got a radical bone in his body. 

It was pretty much my point, that putting someone like that in position ahead of the Tories self immolating will be a missed opportunity thats a topic of conversation amongst British comrades for years to come.

On 4/27/2024 at 4:24 PM, SuperBacon said:

Central badge but not a central swoosh. Die.

Looks like a tribute to the Cov side that beat Spurs in the 1987 FA Cup Final.

#GaryMabbuttsKnee

As someone broadly of the soft, drippy centre left - eating bacon sarnies with Ed Miliband, ballroom dancing with Ed Balls and saving the world with Gordon Brown in the main - I don't really feel too passionate about this one way or the other, but...

I suspect one of the great tragedies of the actual British left, and something that will stay engraved on their collective psyche for decades, will be that they couldn't hold the Labour Party a few years longer. The margins might be smaller, but I think whoever the Labour candidate was now they'd be beating the Tories.

It's almost a historical hinge point for the country, that Labour decided to 'get serious' right before the Tories stripped naked, shot each other in the arse and set themselves on fire.

So much of the 'appealing to Tories' that Starmer is doing makes cynical sense by traditional election and political standards, but you get the feeling he's piling in viagra after the stiffy has formed. 

He could easily afford to be more radical, I think.

Worried about putting this in the twitter thread for fear of spoilers, however minor, but this is top notch.

Punk and McInture is so, so good. Punk is at his absolute best when he's got a proper wrestling story to sink his teeth into, and Drew is killing it as a lunatic descending ever further into madness.

Twenty stars.

Logan Paul is great. Nineteen stars.

Whoever is directing the shows at the minute is doing a sterling job, there are always some brilliantly framed shots. Twenty five stars.

That video is great. You get to see both sides of the new Phil. Complete gentleman with kids, doing the autographs and taking the photographs, then the minute he hears the deep voices of male, middle aged wrestling fans who might want to talk for hours about kayfabe, Khan and star ratings? Absolutely pegs it.

My guy.

Either LA Knight is turning heel, or they've properly decided they can't be arsed.

There's barely anything for him to do, unless the US title is the pinnacle of his ambition.

In fact, to Rooster's point, there's barely anything for Cody to do. A heel turn for someone surely, be it KO, Orton or Knight.

The draft was almost unbelievably shite, though. Completely pointless. The best pick was Jade as it was completely consistent with how she's been portrayed, and how Nick Aldis pursued her signing. But, besides that, it's hard to justify much of what they did. Even drafting Gunther and Carmelo Hayes is dumb if you look at it for more than a second; if this was an NFL draft maybe you pick the young next guy first, as they're reasonably likely to stay with your team as long as you want them, but the WWE do drafts or shake-ups every year. It makes absolutely no sense to not just pick the biggest names first.

Punk getting drafted above Iyo Sky will make me sad until at least tomorrow. Rubbish.

You can tell Punker is back on his way to rude health, on the weights and feeling sexy again. He absolutely loves cutting the sleeves off his shirts when he feels like his arms deserve to be seen.

Breathe easy, everyone.

Odyssey Jones has been drafted to Raw.

I can't even begin to fathom the kayfabe reasoning behind some of those draft picks.

Iyo Sky getting drafted above Punk and Hunk has to signal the end of the new boom era.

It's over. Done. Someone tell The Rock he can stay in Hollywood.

I think the final test of Punk's damascene like conversion to a life of good humour and good grace would be him being a fourth round draft pick on Monday, after schlubs like Nakamura.

As it is, I suspect he'll be picked ahead of Drew and it'll make DM Hunk sad.

5 minutes ago, Mr_Danger said:

Wrestling can be stupid as long as it’s fun. That draft was just stupid. Why didn’t anyone pick Roman or Punk? Was that explained? 

Multiple times, to be fair.

There was a draft pool of eligible picks for Friday's draft, and Heyman did a whole segment withdrawing Roman from the draft.

Darby Allin should have climbed Everest where he'd be safe, instead he's been managing the danger of downtown New York where he, first, broke his foot and now? He's got himself hit by a bus.

https://www.instagram.com/p/C6SnFF6OAnu/?igsh=bDU0eHZicXdidTlz

He'll even unintentionally take the big bumps..

Just seen it.

Brilliant. Really enjoyed it. I loved how they kept it ambiguous in terms of kayfabe, it sort of allowed you to think that the reason the dad was such an exacting prick was because he himself couldn't see through the blurred lines.

Zac Efron, who I've not seen in much bar bro comedies, was absolutely exceptional. The slow steady descent into misery was so beautifully done.

That final scene with his sons is one of the best scenes I've seen in recent memory. Heart breaking, beautiful, tragic yet uplifting.

Good film.

24 minutes ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

After threatening to for years to do it properly, I had my first completely WWE free week. I survived, I just used that time in other ways. 

Starting a thread about a WWE PPV, for one.

Freedoommmmmm.

18 minutes ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

WWE’s first live PLE from France is a week away. Here’s the card which looks like, to me, an average TV show 

thoughts?

My thoughts are you definitely don't help yourself, and this thread is in very real danger of being derailed from the outset.

That saiddd...

AJ/Cody should be good, but they could do with getting through it and finding Cody a proper adversary to see him through to Summerslam season. I don't really know who that could be... Orton, maybe, but sod knows how you unpick Orton from the Bloodline stuff without him first needing to feud with Owens.

Smackdown actually doesn't have much in the way for stuff for Cody to do, really.

Turn LA Knight heel?

Fuck knows.

Jey Uso is losing. Probably thanks to Judgment Day, but not ruling out some more Bloodline fuckery.

I'm guessing Jade or Bel Air are turning on the other.

Would rather Ivar had Bronson Reed's spot.

I'm banging my head against the same wall on this, but still... absolutely mental that Montez Ford is cocking about in the Street Profits still. Sod it, turn him heel (again) and get him in with Cody.

Montez and Bianca vs Cody and Jade through Summer. Let's go.

15 minutes ago, RedRooster said:

I don’t think it’s small at all, I’m totally with you on that. Breakker wasn’t on Smackdown long enough to get himself involved in a storyline - it’s a really bizarre way to book him. And while I understand the message they were trying to send by drafting Hayes so early, they partly undid that by having him lose to Cody on night one. It was a night of strange decisions.

And if NXT wrestlers are eligible, why would you draft Kiana James over a higher achiever? Zero logic.

Which sort of comes to one of my stranger issues with the draft, why on earth are they sending out legends as proxies to make the picks?

They pretty much all just did the bare minimum, and never gave any impression they knew or cared why picks were being made.

Have Aldis out there waxing lyrical about how Carmelo Hayes has a blend of athleticism and charisma that will make him a hit in the ring and on the balance sheet for Smackdown; Have Adam Pearce talking up how he was gutted to miss out on Bron Breakker originally, but he never looks a gift horse in the mouth and is delighted to get a second chance at signing someone he considers to be a future Wrestlemania main eventer.

If Champion's are protected, but No 1 contenders aren't, tell us why Raw are desperate to lock down Jey Uso but Smackdown are more sanguine about AJ Styles.

Just give it a bit of purpose.

Instead it was handled like a straight-to-youtube edition of the Slammy's with no one really caring or selling it at all.

Trying to limit the old fizzy drinks as my health hits the panic button, but the new Pepsi Max Mango might threaten that.

Absolutely tremendous stuff. 

2 minutes ago, SuperBacon said:

Am I the only one that thinks it actually looks quite good then?

Possibly, but given the increasing us vs them divide on this forum, I'm willing to join your team.

What a spot.

3 minutes ago, Supremo said:

It’s a shame. If they’d timed that better and Cody caught him with the Cutter it would have been great. You assume they practiced it earlier in the day and managed to get it to work. Doesn’t feel like the type of spot you call on the fly.

I suspect this is just the first of many instances in the upcoming months where other pro-wrestlers learn a hard lesson in real time. They might be good, they might be athletic, they might even be successful, but they’re not Will Ospreay or Bryan Danielson. Just because they make it look easy doesn’t mean it is.

Oh shit, I hadn't even considered he was supposed to hit it.

They covered it well.

6 minutes ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

Is it the same/in relation to this one https://www.ringsidenews.com/2024/04/01/accuser-janel-grant-claims-coercion-in-alleged-love-letter-to-vince-mcmahon/

Dunno.

Maybe.

Honestly, I'm choosing not to get to into it. It's awful and depressing and I hope the truth is discovered and anyone culpable held responsible.

Beyond that, I haven't got the emotional energy to give it.

If I was a better person, I'm sure I'd give up wrestling altogether (which, to my shame, I initially said I would), but it's about the only entertainment I have left that I actually enjoy and takes my mind off work.

So yeah, all shit. Wish I'd found a better hobby when I was a kid.

3 minutes ago, Keith Houchen said:

Nah, nor really. He could simply say that he meant Weinstein was the biggest name in film production like Coca Cola are in soft drinks and he got his metaphors muddled up on live tv. 

This is probably true.

By conflating a person with a company he's probably weighted it just right to be outside of any legal repercussion.

They'll just book Rock v Austin on a special Wednesday Night Rawdown next time Tony has a big announcement, one would imagine.

I should stick to my own words about staying away as this thread has become exactly what it was always going to, but...

On the defamation piece, I'd still err on the side of caution. In the past 24/48 hours Vince has apparently produced written evidence from the complainant, at the end of their entanglement (refuse to say relationship as sounds gross in the context of the allegations) where she professes her love for him and how much she'll miss him etc

I don't know the validity of that evidence, or the effect it'll have on the case. There's no reason it couldnt both exist and be completely consistent with the allegations. That said, it probably does increase the likelihood that the case ends either with a settlement and a mutually agreed finding of no wrongdoing, or there's even a small chance that it all ends with no settlement and the complaint is not upheld and is found to be substantively untrue or unlikely to be true.

If that happens, it'll be up to the discretion of the WWE/TKO legal teams as to how they handle anyone (with big or small platforms) that made any suggestions at any time that the company was involved in crimes of this nature.

So, yeah. Neck brace? What a silly wally.