WWE Main Event 12/08/2014

Seth Rollins vs Kofi Kingston

Two exceptionally inconsistent wrestlers here, but the stars align and this ends up being a decent match. The big problems Rollins has always had is that he wrestles like a face, but he looks and sounds like a whiny brat heel. Here, he’s a shit to poor Kofi, trash-talking him in the corner, stood on his back and forcing Kofi to look at his MITB briefcase. There’s a nice bit where he stops and smirks at the “You sold out” chants, and this brief pause gives Kingston recovery time to duck a clothesline and hit a neat springboard dropkick and a big dive to the floor. Seth works a brief heat on Kofi after slamming him into the barriers, but Kofi takes over when he evades a corner splash, hitting a pendulum kick as Seth leaps into the corner. Kingston is kept looking really strong, getting nearfalls from a corner crossbody and the SOS, to the extent that I thought he might win. He doesn’t, as Rollins stops a superplex attempt by sunset flipping into a running corner bomb, and the Kerb Stomp gets three.

The Usos vs Rybaxel vs Sheamus & Rob Van Dam

This is for the Usos tag title, and the Sheamus/RVD team really stands out as “We had nothing for these guys this week”. I’m not sure that the team added anything to the standard good Usos/Rybaxel match, but it did add an interesting riff on the psychology. As the heels, Rybaxel end up working a heat sequence, in this case on Sheamus when Ryback catches a Brogue Kick into a powerbomb. To stop anyone tagging in, Rybaxel can’t even cut the ring in half, they basically have to contain Sheamus to their quarter of the ring, and they manage to do this convincingly, with Axel doing this awesome little scrabble for purchase, using momentum to roll Sheamus away from the hot tag. Impressive stuff. In the end, RVD gets the hot tag and goes through the greatest hits. There is a nice rolling senton/rolling thunder spot by Sheamus and RVD, but aside from that Van Dam isn’t cracking out the new stuff. The Usos are slightly marginalised, but Jimmy gets to light up Ryback with a vicious sounding series of chops and Jey hits a big dive to the floor. Neat ending sees RVD push Axel off the top and nail him with the Five Star, but Jimmy Uso had already blind tagged Axel, and he followed RVD with his own top rope splash, getting the pinfall on Van Dam. Overall, good stuff.