IPW:UK King of Europe Cup 2007

IPW:UK King of Europe Cup 2007IPW:UK King of Europe Cup 2007

By Big Red Machine
From April 29, 2007
Discussion

IPW: UK King of Europe Cup 2007 (4/28 & 29/2007)- Liverpool, England

Day 1:
FIRST ROUND MATCH: Chris Hero (CZW) vs. Claudio Castagnoli (CHIKARA)- 6/10
Oddly enough, despite representing CZW in this tournament, Hero had actually lost a Loser Leaves Town match to Eddie Kingston earlier in the month. So… first match into the tournament… and they kind of caved in the center of the ring. That should make for an interesting night.

FIRST ROUND MATCH: Go Shiozaki (NOAH) vs. Martin Stone (RQW)- 7/10
Ring appears fixed… but it looked solid in the beginning, too, so who knows.

FIRST ROUND MATCH: Trent Acid (PWU) vs. Pac (IPW: UK)- 4.25/10
Apparently this was a No DQ’s match. At one point Acid set Pac up on some chairs on the outside for a moonsault, but overshot and slammed into the stairs and a chair. It looked brutal. There were a lot of brutal-looking bumps in this one, but almost no psychology and not enough selling to really capitalize on them. There were about four different moves in this match that should have been the finish, to the point where one of Pac’s flippy moves just didn’t seem like a good enough finish.

FIRST ROUND MATCH: El Generico (IWS) vs. Matt Sydal (IWA-MS)- 6/10
We got some great comedy early on with both men trying to avoid the middle of the ring, fearing it would break again if they stepped on it. Eventually Generico got back suplexed into the middle of the ring and sold it like he had been suplexed onto a land-mine. Then, slowly both men and the referee realized that the ring had not, in fact, collapsed, and then Generico and Sydal both just charged across the ring at each other. Fantastic stuff. After the comedy, they got down to some good wrestling and high flying.

FIRST ROUND MATCH: Ares (WxW) vs. Doug Williams (Premiere Promotions)- 6.25/10
Felt like it dragged a lot towards the end.

FIRST ROUND MATCH: Davey Richards (PWG) vs. Zebra Kid (WAW)- 6/10
Apparently Zebra Kid was wrestling this match while on a weekend release while serving a term in prison… which I guess would kind of make him the forerunner to Wrestlicious’ Felony.
Lots of crazy stuff early on, including crowd brawling, a piledriver through a table, and a dive off of a balcony (both from Zebra Kid). Unfortunately, the arena was dark and the cameras weren’t able to get into a good position, so most of it ranged from very hard to impossible to see.
Then they got back in the ring and after Zebra Kid missed an elbow, Davey managed to slow him down by using a bunch of arm submissions, and finally got the win after a low blow and then another submission. The match was very short, but they surprisingly managed to do a great job of making the transition between crazy dives and submissions seem natural.

FIRST ROUND MATCH: Jody Fleisch (1PW) vs. Ryo Saito (Dragon Gate)- 6.75/10
We got some good action… and then Jody Fleisch pretty much died when he went for a Shooting Star Press to the outside and his face slammed into the steps… and he kept wrestling. Lots of high-flying in here, as you would expect, and every time Fleisch landed on his face really made you flinch.

FIRST ROUND MATCH: Nigel McGuinness (ROH) vs. Rhino (TNA)- 7/10
Loud “FIRE RUSSO!” chants when Rhino showed up. They had a crazy brawl, with Nigel surprisingly getting the better of it. He shoved Rhino down a flight of stairs and punched him off of a balcony (unlike Richards and Zebra Kid, they made sure to do it in such a way that the camera could see it). Nigel even did a splash off of a ladder! They managed to get back into the ring and brawl some more, and traded a few good false finishes. The crowd was mostly behind Nigel, but Rhino had a surprising amount of support, considering that Nigel had just headlines two ROH shows in this very building with awesome matches the month before and the fact that Nigel is British.

Day 2:
QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Chris Hero (CZW) vs. Doug Williams (Premiere Promotions)- 7/10
A great British-style wrestling match. This was a lot more along the lines of what I was expecting from this tournament as opposed to last night’s high-flying and crazy dives. For some reason Doug turned heel after the match by not shaking Hero’s hand after Hero put him over on the mic.
While talking about how Johnny Saint has influenced both of these men’s careers, one of the announcers mentioned that he once lent one of his Johnny Saint tapes to Paul Burchill, but it was a pirated taped. FANTASTIC!

QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Nigel McGuinness (ROH) vs. Pac (IPW: UK)- 6/10
Pac’s head is all taped up after suffering a head injury last night. Nigel tells him that he should think about his future, and heading into a match against Nigel McGuinness with a head injury is not good for your career. Pac decides to wrestle anyway. This segment did a good job of setting the match up because every single time Nigel hit Pac in the head, it came across as a possible finish. Great story.

QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Go Shiozaki (NOAH) vs. Davey Richards (PWG)- 7.5/10
Davey works over Go’s Arm, Go works over Davey’s leg, both men strike hard. Davey uses another low blow to allow set up the kimura and gets the win, just like last night against Zebra Kid.

QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Matt Sydal (IWA-MS) vs. Ryo Saito (Dragon Gate)- 7.25/10
Much more of a Dragon Gate-style match than Saito’s match last night… which makes sense, considering that both men were working for Dragon Gate at this point.

SEMIFINAL MATCH: Nigel McGuinness (ROH) vs. Davey Richards (PWG)- 4/10
An extremely short match. They went immediately into the heat with Davey jumping Nigel before the bell and Nigel’s comeback was already going into false finishes. Being hit with a couple of finishers did allow Davey to save face for losing so quickly. They had some pretty cool spots in here, too, including the most awesome counter to Nigel’s top-rope lariat that I have ever seen.

SEMIFINAL MATCH: Matt Sydal (IWA-MS) vs. Doug Williams (Premiere Promotions)- 5.75/10
Doug’s heel turn continued, jumping Sydal before the bell. This was another pretty short match, considering its place on the card. Doug wins with a small package for the third time in the tournament.

2007 KING OF EUROPE CUP FINALS: Nigel McGuinness (ROH) vs. Doug Williams (Premiere Promotions)- 8/10
Definitely not what I expected from Nigel McGuinness and Doug Williams. There were ref bumps, crowd-brawling, some weapons, and even a spot with referees fighting. The stuff with the referees was kind of wacky, but it worked. They made good use of some of the recurring stories throughout the tournament and built to a good finish. To be honest, I’d have rather just seen these guys wrestle a straight match, but this was great, too.

Suffice it to say that this tournament was very different from what I expected from a “King of Europe Cup.” There was definitely some great, British-style wrestling, but mostly from just Nigel, Doug, Hero, Claudio, and Ares. The lack of DQ’s was a big surprise, and I certainly never expected to see balcony dives.
While the tournament finals was an awesome match, nothing on this show was truly special. There was nothing really worth going out of your way to see. In fact, many of the matches feel the like the same match over and over, especially on night one, but, surprisingly, I found myself not really caring. This was just a whole bunch of enjoyable wrestling matches, so I’d definitely recommend checking it out if you want to, but I can’t say it is really worth going too far out of your way to see.

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