Cero Reviews PROGRESS Chapter 57: Enter Smiling

[cero2k]

PROGRESS Chapter 57: Enter Smiling
November 12, 2017
O2 Ritz, Manchester, Eng

Jim Smallman Intro - Business as usual, nothing new. Don't Be A Dick.

Jimmy Havoc & Mark Haskins w/Vicky Haskins vs Jack Sexsmith & Matt Riddle - 7/10
New intro song for the newly formed heel team, I really hope they don't use the name HHH. Sexsmith is out here getting revenge for last show's attack, so he brought out his secret partner, his BRO! The heels jumped the faces during introductions and proceeded to brawl a bit outside. Once back in the ring, H&H got the heat on Sexsmith for a while, mostly working his back and neck. It was a bit of a bad babyface in peril run since the only one hope spot led to the hot tag, otherwise, Sexmsmith just got his ass kicked. Riddle, in complete contrast to Sexsmith actually beat up on both H&H, until guess what, yeah, Sexsmith made it back to the match.

Riddle was getting the match back for his side, but Vicky distracted him and the ref, leading to an opening for H&H to tape Riddle's hands to the ringpost, and so Sexsmith was easy pickings for H&H to destroy him, they did several double team moves including tandem dudebuster and a acid rainmaker with a superkick in the middle for the pin. Good debut for the team, tho I think it Riddle was too competitive for them, this should had been Sexsmith and Mambo in a squash with some hope spots. After the match Riddle got loose and tried to save Sexsmith, he managed to run off Triple H.

Vicky Haskins has to be the best and worst valet I've seen in the last 10 yrs, she didn't do much to hype her boys, but she's perfect for the team.

Doug Williams vs "Ironman" Joe Coffey - 7.5/10
Early in the match, it was pointed out that Williams was 1 day shy from 25 years since his debut, and so the match was somewhat built around on young vs old. This is also Coffey's return to PROGRESS after his WCPW run and ICW title win, so he's here to prove something too.

The match was completely back and forward, big lads wrestling style with both men clashing with lariats and throwing each other around the ring. We had a really good near fall when Williams hit the Chaos Theory, but soon after Coffey hit the Discus Lariat for the win.

Post-match - Williams took the mic, only thing he said was "I don't think I can do this anymore" Jim and the fans pleaded to him that he still had it.

PROGRESS Women's Championship No. 1 Contender Match
Alex Windsor vs Candyfloss vs Jinny vs Dahlia Black - 7/10
Man, Candyfloss is lucky that I love her, otherwise I'd totally bash her for ripping off the Gravity Falls intro. Toni Storm is at commentary. Black and Jinny obviously went straight for each other from the get go and started brawling all over the ringside area into the chairs; meanwhile, Windsor and Candyfloss fought in the ring. Toni Storm is just screaming 'chairs CHAIRS!" Soon after, Black and Jinny went on brawling to the locker rooms with an awesome cameo of Jim Smallman.

With Black and Jinny nowhere to be seen, this match pretty much became Windsor vs the debuting Candyfloss for a while, ending with Floss locking in an armbar. At this point Black and Jinny came back and saw that Floss was about to win and in a lack of judgement, they worked together for a bit to stop the lock and take out Floss, but Floss pretty much took on all three and survived. The match finally became a proper 4-way in the ring, we saw a tower of doom, and at the end, Windsor took out Floss with something like the Ram-Paige DDT for the win, Black and Jinny were still busy with each other. Candyfloss is gonna be a huge babyface in 2018, she has the tools to be huge in the business.

Candyfloss vs Candice LeRae. Make it happen Glenn.

Grizzled Young Veterans vs Moustache Mountain -
This MM entrance is now the most annoying thing in the world. Before the match, Gibson tried to make a point that he agreed with me, but the fans kept interrupting, so rude. Seven stole the mic and bragged that they had WWE contracts and not broke like Gibson's dad. Fuck that dick, 200% sure on who the tools are, fucking 205Live geeks. Go Gibson For Ever!

The match started with shitty MM comedy, but soon after Joseph Connor came out and beat up MM along with GYV. Connor was talking shit on Dunne, and so to the big surprise, Dunne came out. Big ovation. And thus....

British Strong Style vs Grizzled Young Veterans & Joseph Connors - 7/10
Match started with all 6 brawling on the outside, we saw BSS use kids and grown ups as weapons, and eventually after a million years, GYVs finally got things in order throwing Seven in the ring for the match to officially start. Seven did more of his shity comedy and he got his ass kicked for it, he was the 205LiveGeek in peril for a while, and during all that time, Bate and Dunne were dead on the outside.

Bate eventually made it back and got a hot tag, Dunne was still outside caring for his elbow. Without Seven and Dunne, Bate soon after became the 205LiveGeek in peril, but he did have more hope spots than Bate, leading to Dunne getting the tag. Dunne in his hot tag tried to play Ishii and offered his chin, and I could totally dig Dunne not selling the forearm to the face, except it was Drake's and the forearm is his claim to fame, so way to no sell someone's big move. After they kept fighting for a while, Connor got bored and used a chair on Dunne and thus they were DQd. This could had been a lot better than it was if MM wasn't a shitty comedy gimmick and Connor wouldn't get the DQ.

Post-match - Pete Dunne asks for a one-on-one with Connor.

PROGRESS Tag Team Championship Match
Ringkampf vs CCK (C) - 7.5/10
Ringkampf was being all honorable and about sportsmanship, but those dicks CCK are jumping them, giving them wet willies, and low blowing Thatcher, why would anyone wanna piss off WALTER and Thatcher? Most of the match was back and forward, building towards the first time where Lykos would have to fight WALTER, which wasn't as good as I would have hoped. The match continued with Ringkampf mostly on top until CCK managed to get WALTER out of the ring and out of nowhere managed to hit the SFTM to barely manage to hold on to the titles. Good match.

Flash Morgan Webster vs "Limitless" Keith Lee - 7/10
This was the usual small fast guy vs Keith Lee match we tend to see often now a days. I felt that Webster had a lot more offense than he should had in this match, at least because they were not exactly hope spots and they were moves that were not that credible that would warrant taking down Lee with Webster's weight (see reverse huracanrana). Having said that, some of Webster's kickouts were awesome. Lee eventually put down Webster with Ground Zero.

PROGRESS World Championship Match
"Kiwi Buzzsaw" Travis Banks (C) vs Mark Andrews - 8.5/10
Match was back and forward, with Andrews slowly building towards the win, but at the end, as Andrews hits the SSP, Banks reverses it into a submission for the win. Andrews worked on Banks neck and upper back while Banks worked on Andrews' lower abdomen. Kicks and chops and a great match overall.

Post-match - Eddie Dennis comes out and attacks Andrews from behind. Banks tries to save him, but Dennis takes him out with a forearm and a buckle bomb. He hit the Next Stop Driver on Andrews. He hinted going for the PROGRESS Championship as he hit another NSD on Banks.

OVERALL THOUGHTS
A great show overall, but with slight annoying things like the new BSS. I think reordering the matches would have really made a difference.