Last time in the last Best and Worst of NXT UK: Rhea Ripley had a faceoff with Jazzy Gabert, and Kassius Ohno barely bested Sid Scala in a British Rounds Match. If you’d like to read previous installments of the Best and Worst of NXT UK, click right here. Follow With Spandex on Twitter and Facebook. You can also follow me on Twitter if you want.
And now, the Best and Worst of NXT UK from September 18, 2019.
Worst: Don’t Mess With The Bull
I still don’t get it. They made a big deal out of Oliver Carter debuting, and now they’re jobbing him out to guys like Joseph Conners and Mr. Ill-Fitting Mask Ligero. Maybe they’re working towards an underdog story, but that doesn’t really work with a guy we have no previous relationship with. At least Carter gets in some offense here, and he does seem pretty fun in the ring. I just need something more if I’m going to get invested than him losing to guys I have no interest in seeing win. And all that’s aside from the obvious optics of having one of the few black performers on a very white show consistently fail. If he was the only person you were paying attention to, you’d think Vince was booking this show or something.
Best: Kommandant
Just so we understand what a nasty villain he is, WALTER spends a few minutes abusing random trainees at the WWE UK Performance Center. He says NXT UK has no future because all of these guys are terrible and do things like laugh when something funny happens. WALTER is no rock and roll fun and one of these days a hero is going to have to rise up and destroy him.
Best: Big Boy Strength
Meanwhile, Tyler Bate returns for the first time since TakeOver: Cardiff to say that he feels bad about losing to WALTER but he’s got a lot of fight left and he has no intention of leaving NXT UK. Then Jordan Devlin comes out to say that he could have beaten WALTER and if it had been him in the match at Cardiff, he’d be champion right now. Naturally the moment Bate comes back at him, Devlin immediately backs off. This is about as naked as match set-ups get, but it’s a match I’m here for.
Worst: Under An Ombré Moon
Dani Luna is a Welsh wrestler who trained Mark Andrews, and she’s here today to lose to Nina Samuels. Nina still doesn’t quite do it for me, but I’d like to see her get there. She has great facial expressions, but that’s about the extent of her in-ring storytelling abilities. They seem to be building her up with matches like this, so hopefully when she gets as far as an actual feud, they find a way to make her work.
I like the haughty actress gimmick in theory, but the problem with a character like that is that it sets you up to look for flaws in her performance, and there are a few. I don’t know, maybe I’m judging her too harshly because most of the NXT UK Women’s Division is so great, but we’ll see where things go.
Best: The Mustache Versus The Mouth
So here we are at the main event, and the only match (out of just three!) on this episode with any build to it, so of course it doesn’t have an ending (but we’ll get back to that)! Out of all the wrestling shows on TV, there is absolutely no reason for NXT UK to seem like it’s treading water right now, except that this is a show that seems to enjoy treading water any chance it gets. As you may recall, I was genuinely delighted by the segments that led to this match, and the match has some great stuff too.
Trent Seven and Noam Dar are both fantastic wrestlers as well as being perfectly developed characters. Noam Dar is a great technical wrestler, but he’d rather make fun of your mustache throughout the match and put your towel down his pants because that’s just the kind of rude jerk he is. Trent Seven is a great worker in his own right, dadbod be damned, but he might rather punch you in the face a bunch of times because you’re being a rude jerk, which is an easy flaw to sympathize with.
It’s also that flaw that loses him this match, since he can’t be bothered to stop punching even though Noam has grabbed the rope and the referee has counted to five. So we’re headed for a rematch, which is fine. I do hope they do something to spice it up though. Is it too soon for a second British Rounds Match? Because I feel like these two could make that work.
One More Thing: It’s A New Day, Yes It Is
Not to be outdone by all the other shows premiering and debuting and generally shifting around next week, NXT UK is moving from Wednesday to Thursday. It will still start at 3pm ET so it can have the 8pm slot in the United Kingdom, but I imagine the replay will move up to 8pm ET, since it’s now on a night with no other wrestling. In any case, this recap will start going up Thursday evenings when that’s possible and Fridays when it’s not. One day later than the previous schedule, in other words.
That’s all for this installment. Join me next week when Tegan Nox challeng Kay Lee Ray for the NXT UK Women’s Championship, and Piper Niven faces Isla Dawn.
