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Introduction, plus first review

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Hello, and welcome to my blog, where I intend to look at a variety of different matches, with different lengths, gimmicks, standard of worker, purposes and give my humble opinion on them. While I may not have the knowledge of a HTQ or a RRR, I hope you'll still enjoy my attempts at match analysis. Without any further ado...

 

Chris Benoit vs The Barbarian-WCW Monday Nitro April 1997

 

I've chosen this match not as the usual "look how good Benoit is against even the worst opponents", but to show my theory that Barbarian is actually underrated as a wrestler. Now, I'm not going to try and convince you he was actually really good, but he's generally looked back on as a talentless muscle man, like his former partner the Warlord. I personally believe that, if he was in his prime today, he'd put the likes of Heidenreich or Snitsky to shame. The match is in the middle of the "Dungeon Of Doom hate Chris Benoit" storyline. Barbarian charges to attack, but Benoit ducks and kicks the tar out of Barbarian in the corner. Barbarian fights back, setting up Benoit for a powerbomb, only for it for be reversed into a sunset flip, where Barbarian makes the ropes. A Northern Lights suplex gets two for Benoit. In a clumsy moment, Benoit telegraphs some interference by looking directly at Jimmy Hart at ringside, before running off the ropes, where Hart predictably trips him up. Benoit levels Hart, but the distraction allows Barbarian to hit a big boot on Benoit on the outside and throw him into the ropes, which looks pretty nasty. Back inside, Benoit ducks a clothesline and hits a German suplex, but gets caught on the top rope, allowing Barbarian to launch him across the ring with an overhead belly to belly. Barbarian tries his top rope headbutt, but misses, allowing Benoit to hit his own for the win.

 

Now, as a short TV match, I'm not going to try and pimp this as an underrated, forgotten classic. However, it was a decent, fun match. Barbarian sold all Benoit's offence believably, especially when getting the shit kicked out of him in the corner. His top rope overhead suplex looked awesome, as Benoit literally went to the otherside of the ring and he looked comfortable going to the top rope, in spite of the fact he missed the move. Obviously Benoit also looked great here, attacking the larger man with hellacious ferocity. Overall, a good match, especially for the time given **

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