TNA Live Event (London, England at Wembley Arena)
Report by Mohammad Zaheer and ProWrestling.net
I went to the Wembley Arena show today and it was a capacity crowd. It was jam packed with just a few seats empty here and there at the back. Dixie Carter even said that it was the largest crowd in TNA history.
Jeremy Borash did his whole schtick with the backstage passes to get the crowd going.
Here’s a short recap of the show, with my observations.
1. Kazarian beat Chris Sabin and Shannon Moore to retain the X Division Title. Sabin was the crowd favourite, though they were chanting Motor City rather than Sabin. Kazarian was over as well. Moore, even though was playing a babyface, was mostly booed. It was a so and so match, as it looked like the wrestlers were just calling it in. Kazarian won with the reverse piledriver he does.
Match two was Madison Rayne, Tara and the Pope vs Angelina Love, Mickie James and Matt Morgan. Believe it or not, the crowd actually sang along to Hardcore Country, which is strange because this is London and country music isnt that popular. Let me just state how over Morgan is as a babyface. This was a very lousy match and most of the crowd was just waiting for it to be over. There was one amusing scene though when Pope held Mickie James from behind, the crowd starting screaming “Rape!” “Rape!”
3. Jeff Jarrett beat Johnny Moss. I think JB mispronounced Moss’s name in the beginning. This was another very basic match with Jarrett winning with the guitar to the head, which received a huge pop even though Jarrett was booed throughout.
4. Beer Money defeated Magnus and Mark Haskins. The match of the night. Beer Money has got to be the most over act in TNA right now. They received by far the most unanimous support throughout the night. Another amusing note, while walking to the tube station after the show, imagine a couple thousands people, one group started screaming Beer, and almost every single person in the vicinity shouted back Money. This continued all the way to the station.
5. Rob Van Dam beat Matt Hardy. Hardy was booed throughout in his match against RVD who was super over. RVD won with the five star frog splash.
6. Ric Flair defeated Douglas Williams. JB introduced Douglas Williams as a future wrestling legend in his match against a current legend Ric Flair. Both men played baby faces and both of them were cheered. Ric Flair won with the figure four leg lock.
7. Mr. Anderson defeated Jeff Hardy to retain the TNA Title. Jeff Hardy came out and was booed. London really seemed to despise the Hardy Brothers. The crowd was very pro Mr. Anderson who came out to a big pop. There were two kids behind me who were dressed in Hardy Boys gear, and seemed to be the only ones screaming “Let’s Go Hardy,” until a group of guys turned around and shouted, “Oye, you two shut up and sit down!” Anderson won, even after interference from Matt Hardy. Lot’s of referee bumps in this one.
Notes: All in all, compared to a WWE house show, this was not bad at all, but not up to the standards they had set in the previous year. I guess due to AJ Styles, Kurt Angle, and Alex Shelley missing, something had to give. The whole presentation was really nice. It looked even better than the Impact Zone.
