NXT UK 06/02/2022

rayclough73
Jun 2, 2022
5 min read

Who’s NXT UK is it?

Our opening match of the night would see Von Wagner fighting Sam Gradwell. It’s been a long time coming for Von to finally showcase his in ring skills on the UK stage and he certainly took the opportunity. Not many people can tower over Sam Gradwell but at 6’5, Von used his towering offense to carry Gradwell and even locked him in a bear hug, a maneuver that’s not often seen inside of WWE rings nowadays. When his typical striking offense proved to be a non-starter, Sam Gradwell would also look to old school submissions by applying a sleeper hold. Using his brute strength, Von was able to nail Gradwell with an angle slam to pick up the pinfall victory. It’s likely that Von may be being built up to earn a shot at Ilja Dragunov for the NXT UK title, similar to Ivy Nile with Meiko Satomura. Still one had to wonder if they’re going to jump right into that program or give Von some more wins on the UK brand first.

Return From the Wasteland

Stevie Turner & Angel Hayze would get to represent women’s action this week. Angel was coming off a loss in tag team action just two weeks prior and Stevie Turner was looking to get back on track after being off television for over a month. During the time away, Stevie has certainly picked up the aggression as she dominates her opponent, with little to no offense coming from Angel. Stevie would quickly pick up her first win in 4 months.

Meanwhile

As we review the backstage segments that build to the show’s future. We first get to see Xia Brookside & Eliza Alexander have their interview interrupted by an angry Amale. While we’ve seen the ring time between Amale & Eliza kept to a minimum, it appears the match the WWE has been protecting is moving forward. While a date hasn’t been confirmed, the outcome of this match will certainly provide a look into how the WWE sees Eliza Alexander. A clean loss to build towards an Amale/Xia match means Eliza is simply just a bodyguard meant to provide a buffer between Xia and any potential opponents. A win, and suddenly Eliza may find herself with more attention than daddy’s little girl.

Ivy Nile would then give a promo citing that Meiko’s experience is to her detriment as Ivy has 26 years of footage to sort through. Meanwhile, Ivy has only a little over a year's experience and she’s put opponents away with efficiency. Next week we’ll see if Ivy has enough to hang with the champ. There’s no doubt that Meiko walks away with the title but Ivy still has the potential of a great competitor so this is still a match to watch. Meanwhile Meiko could be seen in footage taken last week giving advice to Emilia McKenzie after the latter lost their match to Lash Legend. It’s possible we may already know who the “Final Boss’” next challenger will be. And while it may be jarring to see the UK Women’s champion fighting two American competitors back to back, its certainly a sense that Meiko would prefer over her most recent title defense.

Earlier in the day footage revealed that Mark Andrews was leaving physical therapy when he caught Kenny Williams, seemingly trying to take a tire off of Andrews’ car. The two would have a quick brawl that would be separated but not without the cameras catching what appeared to be Tiger Turan watching in the background. While this can confirm that Mark Andrews isn’t one of the masked men haunting Kenny, there are still possibly two others out there. Unless WWE decides to act like that never happened and we instead go back to only one man stalking Kenny. Maybe we’ll get more answers when “The Luckian” & Mark Andrews clash next week.

On another edition of East End Bookie, Noam Dar & Sha Samuels reveal they are set to fight Wolfgang & Damon Kemp in two weeks time. Damon & Wolfgang are both hard hitting competitors but Dar & Sha state that it’s their friendship that will prove to be the difference maker.

Climb the Mountain or Watch it Crumble

Speaking of tag team action, our main event proves to be an excellent showcase that the tag team division of WWE isn’t a lost cause. With Charlie Dempsey absent, Teoman & Rohan Raja would represent Die Familie by themselves. Ashton Smith & Oliver Carter would get their third shot at the Tag Team Titles. And our champions, Moustache Mountain would defend their belts in a match where they don’t have to be pinned to lose. For this triple threat, WWE decided to go with the rule that there will be one competitor from every team legal. A rule that makes much more sense than there only being two legal competitors at any given time. Die Familie worked as true heels in this matchup, even inspiring Tyler Bate & Oliver Carter to work together despite being on separate teams. Smith & Carter have a unique style when it comes to their tag team maneuvers, which makes it easy to admire their tenacity as babyface challengers. Trent Seven works the angle that he’s willing to do whatever it takes to win throughout the match but not always in heelish ways. Something as simple as finding the strength to body slam two men repeatedly in an attempt to keep them both down long enough can speak volumes to his efforts. To Die Familie’s credit they proved effective at cutting the ring in half even in a triple threat setting, earning some much needed time to get some underhanded offense in. The finish would come when Trent Seven would look to use one of the title belts to seal the victory. Tyler Bate would grab the belt and try to convince his partner that they didn’t need to use the titles to win the match. This argument would prove their undoing with Oliver Carter performing a suicide dive to dispose of Tyler, while Ashton Smith would roll up Trent to win the titles. While it’s certainly a feel good story for Smith & Carter, the real story was on the dissolution of Moustache Mountain. Trent would lament to Tyler that he had said if they lost the titles that he would be done and now it’s done. While it’s currently open to interpretation what he truly meant by those words, as Trent leaves Tyler alone in the ring, it’s clear that there is at least one more big program in Trent Seven’s future.