BRM Reviews the 10/8/2020 NXT UK

[Big Red Machine]

DANI LUNA & XIA BROOKSIDE vs. NINA SAMUELS & AMALE- 4.25/10
This was fine, other than the finish. Said finish saw Nina walked out on Amale because Amale didn’t tag her in quick enough after getting worker over and Nina didn’t like not being the center of attention. I understand the character and I do think it can be made to work, but it’s going to require A LOT of dedication from the booking team to keep her actions consistent, to the point where I don’t think taking her character in that direction is a good idea because it would be so restrictive.

ILJA DRAGUNOV IS LOOKING FOR SID SCALA- good
This started with him turning down an interview because “I’m looking for someone” and the camera followed him to Scala, who was hanging out with Pete Dunne. This is how these things should optimally be done.
Ilja wanted a match against Alexander Wolfe and WALTER due to the way last week’s show ended. When asked who he wanted to team with, Ilja pointed at Dunne, who just said “okay.” Dunne came off as way too chill for my liking (shouldn’t he also be angry about last week’s incident?), but other than that, this was good.

PIPER NIVEN INTERVIEW- fine
She was asked for her thoughts on Kay Lee Ray wanting to “address” the women’s division later tonight. She’s probably going to cause a disruption of some sort.

JACK STARZ vs. SAXTON HUXLEY- 4/10
Starz was the guy whose name I didn’t know who had a run-in with Huxley a few weeks back. This was a fine “big monster vs. small underdog” match for the time it got, but it really should have just been a squash.

GALLUS VIDEO PACKAGE- good… I think? Are they supposed to be babyfaces or heels? I don’t remember. This definitely felt like a babyface video package.

PRETTY DEADLY INTERVIEW- bad
They were asked what Eddie Dennis said to them. They gave the “Nonya.” “What’s nonya?” None ya business!” answer that tweenage boys love so much. They’re heels so they’re supposed to be annoying, but this just makes them seem lame.

XIA BROOKSIDE & DANI LUNA INTERVIEW- fine, I guess
Like Piper Niven, they were asked about Kay Lee Ray’s upcoming promo. More threats of “she had better watch what she says.” I understand the purpose of doing this with multiple people, but that doesn’t make it entertaining or interesting.

HERITAGE CUP TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: A-Kid vs. “Flash” Morgan Webster- 7/10
This was a really solid and exciting babyface vs. babyface match. Once again, The rounds didn’t get in the way as much as I worried they would, but I still did think this would have been better as a straight 2 out of 3 falls match.

ILJA DRAGUNOV VS. WALTER VIDEO PACKAGE- great!
He gets his title shot against WALTER in three weeks.

A MYSTERY PERSON HAS ATTACKED “FLASH” MORGAN WEBSTER BACKSTAGE- And I can’t help but notice that Primate was the one who ran and got Mark Andrews to tell him about this. And they were also in the area when Andrews himself was attacked before COVID happened. Hmm…

WOMEN’S SEGMENT- meh
Kay Lee Ray started to cut her promo. Eventually, the rest of the division minus Jinny came out and surrounded the ring. Amale and Nina Samuels started arguing with each other and shoving each other. Piper Niven shoved past them and got up on the apron. KLR concluded her poetic mocking of the rest of the division by calling Niven “a Piper that plays to my tune,” which I guess was the code-word for Amale and Nina to stop arguing with each other and yank piper down. Either that, or it was just a coincidence and those two were annoyed that Piper pushed past them (turns out it was the latter, which makes a lot more sense for Nina Samuels’ character).
While this was happening, Aoife Valkyrie (who had been mocked as “a Valkyrie that can’t fly” got int the ring and hit KLR with a quebrada body press. While Piper brawled with the Amale and Nina on the outside, the other babyfaces (Valkyrie, Isla Dawn, Dani Luna, and Xia Brookside) all surrounded KLR. Instead of rolling out of the ring, KLR bravely charged into the one-on-four fight… and managed to take a bit of a beating, but escaped after shoving Isla into Piper Niven as Piper got into the ring, and then superkicking Xia.
The four babyface in the ring started to argue and then brawl. Nina and Amale kept on brawling, and Xia and KLR started to brawl on the outside. KLR won that brawl and headed for the ramp, where she was cut off by Jinny. KLR thought Jinny would be her friend, but Jinny attacked her instead and beat her up. They brawled backstage a bit but wound up back by the ring so Valkyrie could do a dive onto the pile but KLR escaped.
On the one hand, this was one of those segments that was so clearly scripted to the point where I would even use the word choreographed and thus it felt phony, but on the other hand, they did do a great job of making most of the things that happened flow naturally from one another. Essentially, you knew it was choreographed, but they did make a big effort to allow for some plausible deniability.



This was a passable show from NXT UK. The tournament is going well, and I’ve got some big Ilja Dragunov matches to look forward to in the next few weeks, but there really isn’t anything else interesting going on.

[NWK2000]

The Heritage Cup stuff is some of the best TV on WWE in 2020. Be prepared.