Sunday, 9 July 2017

WWF Prime Time Wrestling 12/05/1986

George Steele vs Jim Neidhart
This isn’t a match up that really appeals, but this is surprisingly not too bad. Liked the opening where Neidhart suckers Steele to chase him outside and ends up with Steele tangled up in the ropes. This is a really short match, which is probably for the best, as Neidhart goes to get a chair from outside, gets stopped by the ref and in the melee Steele hits him with a loaded fist for the win.

Bret Hart vs Sivi Afi
There’s a noticeable gulf in quality between these two here, Bret being clearly a step or two ahead of Afi. An early O’Connor roll is blown, but at least we return from an ad break with Bret in control. His offence looks really good here, loved how fluidly he goes from dropping a 2nd rope elbow into a pinfall. We get a “Samoan man has a hard head” spot as Afi no-sells a shot to the turnbuckle and rams his own head several times, but aside from that he contributes little. He looks like he’s not really sure how to run the ropes, always going from odd angles. A flipping senton looks more like he’s doing a forward roll, but Bret suddenly catches him with a great-looking backbreaker for the win.

Iron Mike Sharpe vs Corporal Kirchner
Hard to say how I felt about this one, wasn’t a particularly bad match, but nothing about it really stands out. It just…happened. Sharpe continues to be fun at stooging about, leaping about to put over the power of Kirchner’s hammerlock and taking a hilarious fall into the announce table. Sharpe isn’t as much fun on offence – he’s plodding and slow, with big pauses in between blows. Kirchner seems pretty athletic and moves well, but doesn’t do anything to convince he can put a match together. A nice Samoan drop gives the Corporal the win.

Jake Roberts vs Scott McGhee
McGhee is pretty generic on offence, all pretty simple bodyslams and decent punches. Jake’s movement really stood out, loved the way he doesn’t so much climb in the ring as he slinks in. Jake hits a nice stomachbreaker and I dug the mindgames as he held McGhee in a chinlock and slowly dragged him towards the snake bag in the corner. McGhee fires back and looks really good in the process – nice looking back suplex that hits with real impact and a decent second rope kneedrop. Roberts hits a DDT from out of nowhere to win. The post-match ‘snaking’ sees McGhee coughing up blood in a nice twist.

Tony Atlas vs Hercules
This is JIP and we’re instantly into a test of strength spot. Hercules is pretty sluggish in control, which really contrasts with Atlas, who looks fired up on his comeback. Herc locks in a pretty mighty looking torture rack before Atlas gets the win with a sunset flip. Too short to be offensive, at least.

The Killer Bees vs Nikolai Volkoff & the Iron Sheik
Pretty decent match to end the show, it’s a formula tag team match and they interestingly keep Volkoff out for the majority of the bout. The Bees work well in the early stages, isolating Sheik and making quick tags. Brunzell and Blair both spend time as the face in peril, and I liked how, when Brunzell did get to make a small comeback with a sunset flip, Sheik instantly come in to distract the ref and prevent a count. Blair gets locked in the Camel Clutch and gets to hold on a surprisingly long time before Brunzell makes the save. Brunzell gets the hot tag, and looks pretty fired up when he get’s on offence. He locks a sleeper in on Sheik, but Volkoff nails him from behind which gives Sheik the win. Just a nice, solid tag match.

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