RAW Ruthless Aggression Tour

[Guest CanadianChick]

Report Of RAW Ruthless Aggression Tour: Day 1

Posted By Widro on 07.31.03

 

Details of the first Australian tourdate...

 

Thanks to 411 reader Mike Aldren for sending this report:

 

The RAW-brand tour of Australia got under way a few hours ago at the Rod Laver Arena in Melbourne. Initial reports suggest the venue wasn't completely sold out but the crowd was said to be red-hot. Ric Flair didn't appear on the show, no reason as yet for his absence. Here are the results:

 

Scott Steiner def. Test

Spike Dudley def. Stevie Richards

Victoria def. Trish

The Hurricane def. Rodney Mack

Booker T def. Christian

Goldust def. Val Venis

La Resistance def. The Dudleyz

Rob Van Dam def. Kane

Kevin Nash & Shawn Michaels def. Chris Jericho & Randy Orton

 

Through television buys, ticket and merchandise sales WWE expect generate over $6 million for the three-event tour. On a side note, there are still tickets available for the Sydney Superdome show on Friday.

 

Credit: 411mania

[Guest Askewniverse]

Not to take away from CC's thunder, but here's a more detailed report, taken from wrestlingobserver.com

 

WWE house show report 7-31 Melbourne

by Luke Barasic

 

WWE Ruthless Aggression Tour

Rod Laver Arena

Melbourne, Australia

01-08-2003

 

The Fink welcomes everyone, and mentions that HHH would not be appearing and

refunds would be available for the next 15 minutes. He then introduces Stacy

Keibler, and suddenly a refund is the last thing on my mind. Just as she is

about to show the crowd a little more of herself, Eric Bischoff marches down

the ramp and says that the only thing that looks better on her than her outfit

is him. Cue Kane. He runs in and chokeslams Bischoff. He then goes to chokeslam

Stacy, but Scott Steiner runs in for the save. However, he cops a chokeslam for

his troubles. Test arrives on the scene. Kane leaves, and somewhere in this a

match begins...

 

Match 1: Scott Steiner vs. Test

Pretty similar to their other matches. Steiner wins with a move I actually

haven’t seen him use before (must stop falling asleep during RAW). It was a

Rock Bottom variation. Afterwards, Steiner and Stacy celebrate by proudly

presenting Stacy’s ass...ets to the crowd.

Winner: Scott Steiner

 

Match 2: Spike Dudley vs. Steven Richards

This one copped some boring chants. They did a fair few comedy spots. That’s a

little kind. That they attempted comedy spots would be a little more accurate.

Spike won the match with a Dudley Dog.

Winner: Spike Dudley

 

Steven Richards remained in the ring for...

 

Match 3: Victoria vs. Trish Stratus

Not a bad effort from these two. Crowd reacted with oohs and aahs to a few

spots which was encouraging for women’s wrestling. Victoria won the match after

Richards DDTed Trish while Victoria distracted the referee.

Winner: Victoria

 

Match 4: Rodney Mack vs. The Hurricane

Mack was not accompanied by Theodore Long. The Hurricane received a good

reaction. Hurricane won it with a Shining Wizard.

Winner: The Hurricane

 

Match 5: La Resistance vs. The Dudleys

Probably the match of the night. Not because of workrate necessarily, but more

because of crowd reaction. They ate up both The Dudleys and the whole

ambiguously gay French routine. La Resistance won when one of them (again,

should stay awake during RAW) hit D-Von with the French flag. They later

attempted to send The Dudleys through a table, but Spike did a run-in and you

can probably guess the rest. The Dudleys celebrated for a long time after the

match.

Winners: La Resistance

 

Intermission

 

Match 6: Booker T vs. Christian (IC Title)

Again, similar to their past matches minus the Dusty finish. Fairly short

match, with Booker T winning with the axe kick. And, of course, there was a

spinarooni in there as well.

Winner: Booker T

 

Match 7: Val Venis vs. Goldust

Strange match. About 2 minutes in, Val looked like he had seriously hurt his

knee. He sat in the corner, while extra referees rushed to the ring to check on

him. Maybe I’m gullible, but I really thought this was legit as the match

stopped for a few minutes. Of course, just as they were helping him out of the

ring, he attacks Goldust turning himself heel. You’d think they’d stop doing

these sorts of things after all the in-ring tragedies they have suffered.

Eventually, Goldust pins him after a Curtain Call.

Winner: Goldust

 

Match 8: RVD vs. Kane

RVD was very over with the crowd. Kane was as well, for the record. One of the

better matches of the night. RVD won by disqualification after Kane

chokeslammed the referee.

Winner: RVD (DQ)

 

Match 9: HBK/Kevin Nash vs. Chris Jericho/Randy Orton

A lot of stalling to begin with, and then some fairly slow action had sections

of the crowd chanting boring at times. However, they finished strong. HBK hit

Jericho with some Sweet Chin Music for the pinfall.

Winners: HBK/Nash

 

Notes:

-The actual crowd figure was never announced, although Stacy did refer to it

being 15,000. That would be a reasonable estimation. It was a sellout.

-Fit Finlay watched the matches from ringside.

-General consensus was that this was not as good as Global Warning last year.

[Guest CanadianChick]

I have a question: Why isn't Goldberg there?

[Guest Askewniverse]

I think that it's because Goldberg's contract says that he only has to work a certain amount of house shows.

[Guest CanadianChick]

But this is a special set of house shows. Whatever, I don't really care, I was just wondering.

[Guest Choken One]

Goldberg works whatever House shows he wants...I believe his contract reads

 

5 matches per month (Which usually means 3 raws...On PPV and one House Show)

[Guest Lord of The Curry]

Since when is The Downward Spiral a "Rock Bottom Variation"? Stupid fuck.

[Guest Choken One]

Since when is The Downward Spiral a "Rock Bottom Variation"? Stupid fuck.

who knows? Steiner's been Kanyon like lately with new finishers every week.

[Guest Lord of The Curry]

The only two I can remember him using are the SDD and The Downward Spiral. Then again, it IS Raw so I've succesfully managed to block most of it out........

[Crimson Platypus 0]

I've noticed Steiner has been doing more moves lately also. Still slow in the ring though. He just looks like he has the flexability of a cement wall.

[Guest jester]

Match 9: HBK/Kevin Nash vs. Chris Jericho/Randy Orton

A lot of stalling to begin with, and then some fairly slow action had sections

of the crowd chanting boring at times. However, they finished strong. HBK hit

Jericho with some Sweet Chin Music for the pinfall.

Winners: HBK/Nash

 

Of Jericho, Orton, Nash, and HBK, Jericho is the one that lays down. There's a shocker.

[Guest HartFan86]

So from having HHH vs. Brock vs. Rock last year to Randy Orton in the main event?

 

Yeah, I'd say last year was just a tad better.

[Guest Deviant]

My official, long-winded but detailed review of Melbourne's Ruthless Aggression:

 

Going in to Ruthless Aggression, WWE’s second tour of Australia in as many years on the heels of the uber-successful Global Warning, I must admit that I was skeptical and really doubted that I would get a good show. This was mainly because I was in the front row, and felt sure that WWE would find a way to ruin that experience for me, plus Rodney Mack, Scott Steiner and all your other favourites from Raw were on the card. But you don’t care, so on with this exclusive, on-site, front row review of Ruthless Aggression Melbourne. Did I mention I was in the front row? For those that are interested in this kind of thing, the set was a simple small screen with the logos on either side of it and a small steel structure on top of it that didn’t serve any purpose to the show except for Nash’s pyro I believe.

 

Opening

 

Following a god-awful celebrity X-Box challenge that mercifully went a mighty 50 seconds, receiving some of the biggest “boring” chants of the night, The Fink (quite the popular one in my section) gave us the standard intro about laser pens, video cameras and the ability to be kicked out. Thrilling stuff, none of which bothered the guy next to me who filmed a few short clips throughout the night. He then announced that HHH wasn’t showing up due to a groin injury. (Sign opposite me: “My groin hurts and I still showed up”) Having seen him last year, I can’t say I cared. We ended up getting Randy Orton and Jericho vs HBK and Nash rather than Nash vs HHH, so I think the news didn’t really bother anyone. As soon as the Fink told us that we had 15 minutes to get a refund, Stacy Keibler’s music hit. I don’t think a single person even thought about going for that refund... Stacy proceeded to show one side of the arena her best asset, which was not my side....... Ok, calm down, review to write... Stacy was interrupted by the mandatory insignificant GM appearance. Much like Stephanie at Global Warning, Bischoff said nothing of any great importance, hitting on Stacy brefly before Kane’s pyro blew the sh*t out of the stage. Kane promptly chokeslammed Bischoff to a good pop, despite EZE getting nearly no height on it, but the crowd soon turned on Kane as he throttled Stacy. Naturally, this brought out the most useless man on Raw to her aid, transitioning cleanly into the first match with the show off to a great start.

 

Scott Steiner vs Test

 

Okay, I’ll be honest, I didn’t pay much attention to Steiner and Test. I saw a couple of suplexes, a reverse DDT and a Flatliner from Steiner, with Test’s offence being secondary to his hilarious taunting and Steiner kicking the crap out of him for it. As the vast majority of my first roll of film will prove, my attention was focused a little more on Stacy Keibler who stood right in front of me. If that skirt looks tiny on TV, you have no idea, as she bent over the apron to cheer on Scott, well, you get the idea. Steiner celebrated as the lone cameraman filmed my “Steiner Sucks” sign which is so totally not going to get on television... Steiner was too busy admiring his own muscles to notice it, which was disappointing. As Stacy pledged her allegiance to Steiner, Test kicked the steps, hurting his own foot in a funny moment.

 

Spike Dudley vs Steven Richards

 

Again, only the crowd appreciated my “Will Wrestle Richards for Victoria” sign. Yeah, yeah, I took four signs to a non-televised event, sue me, it paid off. I really enjoyed this match, except for Stevie’s tendency to face the other direction, thus scarring my side of the arena with a view of... the logo on the back of his tights. And yes, it can now be confirmed that wrestling is the only heterosexual place that you can scream “Real men wear pink!” at the top of your lungs and not be questioned. Spike did all of his trademark spots and sequences, from the repeated roll-ups to the double stomp and Acid Drop. Good back and forth match. A couple of attempts at comedy, such as Spike taking over from the referee as he massaged Stevie’s back. I had no idea that was in the ref’s job description. Unfortunately, that didn’t go anywhere, and according to crowd response, “kick him in the balls” was the preferred option. Spike seemed to be having a blast, and the freedom of a non-televised event allowed him to be as entertaining as he can be. Spike won with the aforementioned Acid Drop (Dudley Dog for the less educated in the audience).

 

Victoria vs Trish Stratus

 

Stevie sold the Acid Drop long enough for Spike to leave, laying motionless in the ring until Victoria made her way to the ring. You’ll have to forgive me for having a vertical leap of at least four feet when that overplayed piece of crap Tatu song started. Victoria is even hotter in person, if you were wondering. The ladies seemed to know where my camera was, with Victoria bending away from me, and Trish bending towards me. I’m sounding like Jerry Lawler so far, ah well. Some really good wrestling between these two, better than many of their televised matches in my opinion. Trish chopping away at Victoria just wasn’t nice though. Once again, they made sure to hit all of their trademark spots, except for Victoria’s Widow’s Peak finisher, making sure that the audience didn’t miss out on anything they may have wanted to see. Victoria won with Stevie’s help via the StevieT.

 

Rodney Mack vs The Hurricane

 

This was by far the worst match of the night. I started to gain a little respect for Mack as he worked on the arm to start off the match, pressumably setting Hurricane up for his former finisher, the fugiwara armbar. Before the match, he even cut a decent promo, stating that Theodore Long could be there due to Whitey beating him down, as he is now recovering. Jazz also didn’t appear, still selling her injury from Raw many weeks ago. Makes no sense that she’d show up on an insignificant show and blow the angle. Absolutely nobody noticed that she wasn’t there. Anyway, my mounting interest in Mack swiftly disintergrated when his version of working the arm became a two minute armbar. Here’s where those “boring” chants resurfaced, only this time with the entire arena getting in on the act, and rightfully so. Once Hurricane got the advantage, things improved as much as the could have considering the opponent. Once again, Hurricane nailed all of his signature spots, with his flying cross-body block looking as beautiful as it did last year, only this time I had more comprehension of the height and impact. Very nice. Hurricane won with the Shining Wizard which also looks cool, even if it doesn’t do the original move justice. After reading his commentary about his bad match in Europe due to jet-lag, Hurricane and the guys must have arrived nice and early, as he and the entire roster were on fire all night long.

 

La Resistance vs Dudley Boyz

 

La Resistance had to work for their heat, as Australia thankfully didn’t jump on the anti-France bandwagon of American propaganda, except for one or two signs. Of course, they did nothing but go for cheap crowd-insulting heat such as, in reply to defeaning “You are a wanker” chants, the Australian trademark apparantly, “Is that supposed to be some sort of insult? If I was going to insult somebody, I would simply call them Australian”. Cheap, but effective. Their coats are the coolest coats ever, by the way. I also liked La Resistance admonishing the fan with a giant “Get the Tables” sign, telling him to put it down and such. After entering to good pyro minus the rocket part, the Dudleys did the opposite, especially the ultra-vocal Bubba Ray. Bubba got some of the best reactions of the night from his “You bloody wanker!!!” before charging the Frenchie in the corner, and the standard “Aussie, Aussie, Aussie” while punching away at the Frenchie in the corner at another point. The match itself, which was undoubtably a SummerSlam preview, showed a lot of promise for the big match. I personally enjoyed it a lot, but naturally when you have almost 20,000 people completely engrossed in the match with the atmosphere at a fever-pitch, you can’t help but get involved. I also personally applauded Rene Dupree’s dance over the fallen body of Bubba. La Resistance retained their titles(good god the shock!) with a shot with the flagpole that clearly made very minimal impact, if any on D-Von’s head. La Resistance decided to grant the fans wishes and bring out the table, but due to Spike, who was surprisingly popular in both appearances, running in and pretty much beating La Resistance up on his own, it was Grenier(I think) who took the powerbomb through the table. Naturally.

 

The Dudleys then handed a piece of the table to a small girl, who happened to have a WWE pass of some kind around her neck (maybe they were selling them at the stands, but I didn’t see them), which brought out that skeptic in me. They posed, celebrated, went through the crowd and eventually left which lead to our intermission.

 

Booker T vs Christian

 

I didn’t notice anything different between this match and the rest of their matches together, but I guess it was just the fact that it was live and in person made it seem 100x better. Before the match, both men stalled for a while to soak up the hot crowd. It should also be noted that I was opposite the stage and felt Booker’s pyro from that far away, which is just insane. Christian claimed that after he would win back his IC title (hahaha!), they would rename the building to the Christian Colloseum, which I would personally support. I also think it was Christian who tried to get heat by insulting Rod Laver, whom the arena is named after. I don’t think most of the people in attendance even knew who Rod Laver was, much less cared or considered him a legend(of tennis). So that one fell flat. Christian did have his Peeps in support, but we were overwhlemed by Booker-love. I now think I should have made a Christian sign, as he looked our way many times, and I’m pretty sure he read my “We Came to See Jericho” and “Heel Section” signs. Speaking of which, I hope the former Heel Section don’t mind that blatant rip-off, but when I’ve talked to them, they’re all cool. Besides, they liked the one at WrestleMania, so I hardly think a sign at a show no-one will ever see will bother them. Anyway, the match was solid, but could have gone longer. Booker posed for all sides and hit everything we wanted to see, with the Spinaroonie getting a hell of a lot of flashes going off. Booker won with the axe kick after both men scored numerous near falls.

 

Val Venis vs Goldust

 

Before this face vs face match began, Venis cut one of his typical promos, likening himself to the game of golf (shaft, firm but gentle grip, follow through, eye on the balls, you get the idea. But apparantly around the rim is just as good as a hole in one for Val. Good to know.) The match started out nicely with a parity sequence of armdrags from both men, and a showing of mutual respect. However, after about a minute of actual action, Val appeared to twist his leg on his landing off of a hip toss (according to the guy next to me, I missed it). Val went down immediately and it seems like Australia just isn’t good luck for him. He swore once or twice, got Hebner’s help and called for the trainer. He audibly apologised to Dustin as well. As he was being helped out of the ring, he put very little pressure on the right leg before swiftly kicking Goldust who was holding open the ropes for him. Val played us all, and his acting was top-notch. I have a lot more respect for Morley now. Yes, I doubted the legitimacy and claimed “I refuse to believe this until he’s out of the building”, but definately thought “Hey, maybe he is really hurt” and I’m not ashamed to admit it. Not one person around me stuck with a theory of it being all a work, so I wasn’t alone. See kids, skepticism pays off. The match was awesome thereafter, so much for face vs face, the crowd was all over Val, and he deserved every insult, he played his part brilliantly. I cannot emphasise that enough. He should totally be allowed to do that on TV. Val played up his new heel role, choking Goldust with his towel, which Earl Hebner (also quite popular here, and open to say a few words in between or before matches to us) threw out to the crowd and one particularly excited woman. Goldust won with the Curtain Call after one of the most entertaining, due to charisma, matches of the night. Earl lost his mind afterwards, giving the finger and up yours gestures to Val, and to a section of the crowd who were probably chanting “You screwed Bret”, which I couldn’t hear. Val’s actions also earned him a “Na Na Na Na” send off, which he also milked for all it was worth.

 

However, in a moment that made me respect my fellow Australian wrestling fans, after booing and singing Val all the way up the ramp, we gave him a respectful applause before he left, to show our gratitude for the best fake injury I’ve ever seen.

 

Rob Van Dam vs Kane

 

With Shane in the picture, perhaps Kane vs Shane will take this match’s spot at SummerSlam, but when it does happen (properly), it will be good. Kane’s pyro was pretty lous, but not as loud as I had expected after all the on-site reports I had read. My main problem with it is that I’m pretty sure my photo is screwed because the post I was shooting fired late. Ah well. Kane’s instensity was great and RVD had no problem doing his usual rubber-man style bumping, including the beautiful get-pushed-off-the-top-rope-onto-the-guardrail spot. Both men landed on the outside right in front of me at one point, but did keep the action in the ring, much to my relief. The was very little brawling and more wrestling, mainly so both men could hit their spots for the crowd, including all of RVD’s acrobatic ones, even the 5 Star Frog Splash thanks to a ref bump. As Kane was also screwed by the unconscious referee, instead of being disappointed like RVD, he chokeslammed him, causing a second official to disqualify Kane. Much to nobody except the ref’s surprise, this also angered Kane, giving us a second chokeslam-to-zebra with little height.

 

Main Event: Randy Orton and Chris Jericho vs Kevin Nash and Shawn Michaels

 

During the previous match, the big screen stopped working, so we didn’t see Evolution’s video and fans in the rafters probably didn’t get as good of a view of Kane vs RVD. Mercifully, it kicked back in a few seconds after Jericho’s music hit, giving us an out-of-synch but no less cool Y2J entrance. Jericho hadn’t remembered last year’s “You are a wanker” chants, and once again questioned them, justifying them by deducing that wanker must mean sexy beast. He then claimed that all the ladies know that Randy Orton is a sexy best, and so do the men. I don’t want to know how the men know that. Kevin Nash has the most pathetic pyro I have ever seen, ever. He posed on the ramp rather than the ring, and all he had was four tiny sparklers that barely beat Gillberg’s for size. Shawn, in homoerotic white tiger chaps, was one of the most charasmatic guys on the show and was just having fun. When the guy next to me shouted out “Hey Hickenbottom!” he simply replied “Yes?!?” He also complained to Finkel about how loudly he rang the bell, claiming it hurt his ears.

 

Meanwhile, Jericho and Orton bailed to the outside, Jericho read my “We came to see Jericho” sign, but stayed in character, only reading it, looking at me, then walking away. Randy Orton on the other hand read it, then nodded and smiled in approval. That’s right, I now have the Randy Orton Seal of Approval. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

 

The match started (as in, the first minute) slow, getting minor “boring” chants from two or three fans here or there, but they were all shot down by the rest of the appreciative audience. A lot of great stuff in this one, starting off with Jericho and Orton missing their version of the HBK/Nash jumping high 5, and having to settle for a hearty handshake. Once they got started, all four men had their fair share of ring time and no one came close to disappointing, even Orton and Nash. Although, Nash’s punches looked ridiculously fake. I was shocked at how much offence Jericho got, but that was probably wise considering that his pose on the ropes was the most photographed moment of the night. He hit the Lionsault and applied the Walls of Jericho, which were broken up, not kicked out of or broken via the ropes, much to my delight. The RKO looks awesome in person, Orton unexpectedly prevented the Sweet Chin Music with it, making it all the sweeter. A nice, well-structured match that had the crowd going and was an excellent way to end the show. After winning with a successful Sweet Chin Music on Y2J, HBK and Nash walked around the guardrail, giving everyone nearby something to remember and both were very friendly and not just doing it because they had to. The duo did their trademark pose at the top of the ramp to end the show.

 

Other notes

 

I arrived with around 35 mins until start time due to hellacious traffic to find that all Highlight Reel shirts were gone. I tried the merchandise stands outside, in the foyer, in the foyer again during intermission before finally picking one up much to my relief and joy back outside after the show. The Jericho shirt was by far the most popular shirt available. They brought out every Raw roster shirt except for Evolution, or so it seemed. Kane also has a new shirt which I think sucks, which is probably up at Shopzone’s site. I also picked up an RVD and Hurricane shirt.

 

Do not trust taxi drivers at night, they are insane. My guy remained at least 15km/h over the speed limit at all times and crossed three lanes without a second thought to make a right turn. Then again, it did get me all the way home for $17, so I’m not complaining. Yes, this was completely irrelevant to RA.

 

The ring is much smaller in person. It even seemed smaller than the one at Fan Frenzy last year.

 

While the pyro and superstars were out in full force, except for the interesting and disappointing absence of Ric Flair, who toured twice here to promote the event, the smaller details were all missing. The guardrail was hired locally and was the old-school steel, making the two or three bumps into it cooler in my eyes. There were no ringside tables and the belts were just kept at Finkel’s feet for the matches. The bell was also on the floor, and the Fink rang it with a spanner.

 

Shirts were priced $45, a jumper was $100 and other merchandise was similarily priced. So if you are going to either of the Sydney shows, bring a decent amount of money.

 

That’s all I can really think of, but if you are going, have fun. I was thoroughly entertained for the entire night. Even the slow points (Mack), were made entertaining by the vocal crowd, who even at 20,000 looked small compared to Global Warning’s 57,000. What this showed proved to me the most is that the Raw brand is capable of putting on a great show, and the talent have all the ability in the world to back it up, especially when motivated, allowed to do their thing and in front of a hot crowd. Here’s hoping Sydney gets as good of a show as we did.

 

And for the record, primarily due to my seat, I enjoyed Ruthless Aggression much more than Global Warning.

[Adam 0]

Good review man, I only have one question. Did you get my damn RVD picture?????

[Guest Memphis]

Argh. What a fucking piss poor card. A 3 year old on an acid trip could spit out something more original than THAT bullshit.

 

Vince is brilliant. He KNOWS he doesn't have to try in this country to make millions, and this show was evident of that.

[Guest Lightning Flik]

Vince is brilliant. He KNOWS he doesn't have to try in this country to make millions, and this show was evident of that.

...ok. First of all Vince and Brilliant ain't walking hand in hand lately.

 

As for he KNOWS he doesn't have to try in another country. What about North America? Since when has he tried back where he should be?

 

Silly, I say. Silly.

[Guest Deviant]

Original? No. Entertaining and some good wrestling? Hell yeah. Like I give a shit if Booker and Christian have faced each other 329 times, when it is live it is a totally new experience.

 

Orton/Y2J vs Nash/HBK makes perfect sense on recent storylines and is more than likely next week's Raw main event.

 

Victoria vs Trish, who else are the going to face?

 

And Steiner vs Test kept both of them isolated to one match, and it was only the first 8 minutes or so of the show which was spent entirely on Stacy's ass.

 

So repetitious based on recent TV? Yes, but that didn't make it any worse of a night.

 

But it's true that Vince knows he doesn't have to try out here to make money. However knowing that, that means there is zero reasons why we haven't seen a PPV since Armageddon or a SD episode since last September.

 

Man I'm going to miss bitching about not having SD after tomorrow...

[Guest Memphis]

Eh.

 

I wasn't there in the audience I suppose, and when WCW came here back in 2000 I found myself so entertained by a 5 minute Steiner/Sting match that I feared for my smarkhood.

 

Looks like trash on paper though.

[Guest Tonestar]

My report:

 

Arena was pretty much packed apart from the seats behind the stage. As with last year, the Aussie crowd was hot to start and then just died off except for certain moments. The short attention spanned Melbournians seem to pop for entrances and respond to promos but pretty much die during the matches except for stupid clapping (i.e. No RVD chants, etc). The ever popular “You are a wanker” chant got everyone going though.

 

Show started off with Fink getting a nice pop. He welcomed us all and introduced Stacy. She danced a bit and went to take her clothes off when Eric Bischoff interrupted. Kane came out and chokeslammed Eric then went to chokeslam Stacy but Scott Steiner came out to help.

 

Then Test came out (nice heat) and we had our first match of the night. It was actually a decent one, Scott Steiner ended up winning with a bit of help from Stacy and his Flatliner and had a lengthy celebration which the crowd loved.

 

Spike Dudley came out next to face Stevie Richards. Fun little match with some nice comedy and the crowd was nicely into it for the most part. Dudley ended up winning with the Dudley Dog.

 

Victoria vs Trish was up next. Typical “we want puppies” chant but the match was actually quite good. Victoria got the win after Stevie planted Trish with his finisher.

 

Rodney Mack came out next and got what I think was X-Pac heat. Some crappy mic work followed. Hurricane came out to a pretty big pop but the match was horrible. Mack stunk up the ring with resthold after resthold and it sucked that Hurricane didn’t get a chance to show off his skills. Scattered “boring” chants broke out and though I hate them, Rodney Mack made it hard to do anything else. Hurricane ended up winning with the Shining Wizard though.

 

Tag Team Title match was up next. La Resistance entered and got huge heat by saying something like “What the hell is a wanker? Is that an insult? If we were going to insult someone, we’d call them AUSTRALIAN”. Dudleys came out to another pretty big pop and the match was not too bad. Resistance ended up winning when they hit I think D-Von with a flagpole. After the match, one of them (Can’t tell them apart from that far) had one of the lines of the night “You Aussie wankers want tables? We’ll show you tables”. Spike came out though and they put one of La Resistance’s members through the table instead. Really long celebrations afterwards, crowd was way into it. They also got a girl from the crowd and gave her a piece of the table.

 

Intermission came next followed by the IC title match of (surprise, surprise) Booker T vs Christian. Huge reaction for Booker, not bad for Christian either. Christian worked the mic, telling Booker his pop was bigger but Booker replied by getting us to cheer for him again. Decent match but I was getting annoyed with the fact that everytime a resthold was applied, there were some people who started chanting “boring”. Booker T retained after his scissors kick.

 

Goldust vs Val Venis was next. Nice face reactions for both. Val absolutely fooled everyone though at one stage. He sort of wrenched his knee and went down in the corner and it looked legit. Trainers were called out and all to help him walk out of the ring (Again disrespect from some fans chanting boring) but as Goldust went to hold the rope down, Val kicked him in the head. Big heat for that one, pretty much everyone thought it was real. Goldy ended up winning with the Curtain Call. “Na na na na” send off for Val but we applauded him after that anyway.

 

RVD vs Kane was up next. RVD got the biggest pop of the night thus far. Pretty good match, Kane ended up losing. There was a ref bump and finishers involved but in the end Kane chokeslammed a ref and got DQ’ed/ RVD got his revenge afterwards by doing a Van Daminator on Kane.

 

Main Event was Orton and Jericho vs. Michaels and Nash. Jericho, my personal MVP from last year (Though I may be biased because he’s my fav wrestler) grabbed the mic and was immediately greeted with huge “You are a wanker chants”. He had us in stitches again and got huge heat (in a good way). Nash got a decent pop but Michaels’ blew everyone else’s away. Match was decent, kinda slow and again the boring chants were pissing me off. Michaels in the end pinned HBK after Sweet Chin Music. What a surprise. Some celebration from those two closed the show.

 

All in all, wrestling wise was nothing compared to last year but more people worked the mic so that was certainly entertaining. Look forward to their next visit.

 

Biggest Pops

 

1. HBK

2. RVD

3. Dudleys

4. Booker

5. Nash

 

Biggest Heat

 

1. Jericho

2. La Resistance

3. Val Venis when he faked the injury

4. Stevie Richards

5. Test

 

I wish I could have got better seats but I shouted my mum for mother's day so $80 was all I could afford. Would have loved to be up close with Jericho and join in the "you screwed Bret" chant which Earl Hebner took notice of. Anything I tried to start up in my section had no chance.