BRM Reviews the 1/14/2021 NXT UK (WALTER VS. A-KID!)

[Big Red Machine]

JOE COFFEY vs. ED HARVEY- 4.5/10
Ed Harvey is the former Sha Samuels, who is old and hasn’t either had a great match or cut a great promo in years. For some inexplicable reason, he has been signed to a contract.
Coffey dominated early until Harvey got frustrated, rolled out of the ring, grabbed a mic, and started ranting about he was Sha Samuels, not Ed Harvey. Then he got back into the ring and started getting some offense in. I understand what the thought process behind this was, but this sort of artsy thing isn’t worth it to me if in order to get there, you put yourself in a position where the viewer is wondering why they forced this guy to go out there and use this random name when everyone else shows up using their regular indy name.

EARLIER THIS WEEK, SID SCALA ANNOUNCES A FOUR-WAY ELIMINATION #1 CONTENDERSHIP MATCH IN TWO WEEKS- This match will be “Flash” Morgan Webster & Mark Andrews vs. The Hunt vs. Pretty Deadly vs. Ashton Smith & Oliver Carter. While the announcement was being filmed, Pretty Deadly showed up to annoy Scala and show us how confident they are.

EARLIER THIS WEEK, DAVE MASTIFF AND RAMPAGE BROWN HAVE A CONVERSATION IN THE GYM- fine
Mastiff thinks Rampage needs better competition, and of course suggests himself. Rampage is fine with this.

TYLER BATE vs. SAM GRADWELL- 5.75/10
Gradwell cut a good inset promo on the way to the ring. Listening to Gradwell makes me question the decision to bring Sha Samuels in even more. Gradwell is essentially a younger version of the same character, and a better talker.
Bate won clean in a solid seven-minute match.

SID SCALA INTERRUPTS ASHTON SMITH & OLIVER CARTER CUTTING A PROMO AT THE GYM TO TELL THEM ABOUT THE #1 CONTENDERSHIP MATCH- meh
The real purpose of this, I think, was for us to see the two other guys in the background who seemed unhappy. I didn’t recognize them.

ILJA DRAGUNOV ASKS JACK STARZ FOR A MATCH- great!
Ilja is “starting over” after failing to win the NXT UK Title from WALTER, so he wants to face Jack Starz, who was the first person he beat in NXT UK. Ilja, amazingly talented bastard the he is, managed to find a way to spin the fact that Starz is the jobber who everyone beats when they debut into a way to build Starz up. It was quite impressive.
Starz accepted the match.

JINNY PROMO- awesome!
She quickly explained away her association with Joseph Conners (who was out here with her) as a simple quid pro quo, where Conners helps Jinny win matches in exchange for either large sums of money, or Jinny helping him a make a connection to someone else that Jinny’s vast fortunes allow her to have. Then she cut an awesome promo telling us that she would win the NXT UK Women’s Title next week.

JINNY & KAY LEE RAY SEGMENT- very good
Jinny’s promo brought out Kay Lee Ray for their advertised “face to face” time. They cut promos on each other. KLR almost came off like a babyface. Conners got Jinny to back down and not start a fight.

EDDIE DENNIS & THE HUNT PROMO/VIDEO PACKAGE- AWESOME!

NXT UK TITLE MATCH: WALTER(c) vs. A-Kid- 8.5/10
A-Kid’s strategy here was to try to use his speed for hit-and-run attacks until he could chop WALTER down and then go for a submission. WALTER’s strategy was to be f*cking WALTER. The match was tremendous.

This was an awesome episode of NXT UK. The last half hour of the show or so was pure awesome, to the point where I had completely forgotten about the presence of Sha Samuels and the dumb thing they did to introduce him.