ROH in Broxbourne (8/13), Live report

Ring of Honor concluded it’s UK debut with a sold out show in Broxbourne, Hertfordshire last night (Sunday August 13th). Following on from the previous night’s ‘traditional’ ROH show in Liverpool, this show was built around the idea of a series of international dream matches featuring talent from the UK, Japan and the US.

The show began with tag champ Austin Aries coming to the ring accompanied by tag partner Roderick Strong. With heavily taped ribs, an emotional Aries had to announce to the crowd that he would be unable to compete that evening as a result of broken ribs sustained in the match with the Briscoe Brothers the previous night. As the fans chanted Aries’ name, ROH champion (and Pure champion) Bryan Danielson came to the ring and berated Aries for not having the heart to compete and defend his championship for the UK fans. This led to Roderick Strong standing up to Danielson and challenging him to a match later that evening. After much stalling and crowd abuse, Danielson accepted his challenge and we were set for Danielson vs. Strong IV. While leaving, Danielson was attacked with a kendo stick by Pro Wrestling NOAH star SUWA, laying Danielson out on the floor.

The show officially started with the first ‘International Showcase’ match pitting Pro Wrestling NOAH’s Go Shiosaki against ROH’s BJ Whitmer. Taking a while to get going, this was the stiff, striking contest that you would expect from both men. The crowd was initially subdued, not because the match was dull, more that the UK fans were soaking up their first experience of a live ROH show. Chants were split between Whitmer - who the fans have taken to during the recent ROH vs. CZW feud – and Shiosaki, who I think got most of his chants because the fans enjoyed shouting “Let’s go Go”. After several vicious chops, forearms and head-drop suplexes, Shiosaki got the pin with a moosault, but both men were given strong ovations for a strong opening contest.

Next up was a 3-way pitting the talents of the UK’s best high-flyers. Spud, Johnny Storm and Jody Fleisch all got a strong reception from the fans, many of whom will have seen these three cut their teeth in the UK’s FWA promotion. After the usual high-flying, spot-based action, Storm got the pin on Spud with his wonderwhirl finisher. Although this was a slightly underwhelming match by ROH standards, props must go to Spud for taking a vicious looking powerbomb into the guardrail from Johnny Storm, which earned Storm a “you killed Spud” chant.

With all three men laid out in the ring exhausted, Chris Hero, Claudio Castagnoli and Chad Collyer rushed the ring and began attacking the Brits. Most of the fans were unaware that Hero would be present at the shows and as such he got a very heated reaction with fans throwing toilet roll and rubbish at the invading threesome. Coming to the defence of the British fans that Hero had been mocking on the mic came former Pure Champ Nigel McGuinness and UK legend Robbie Brookside. Challenging the Kings of Wrestling to a tag match, the subsequent 3-on-2 beat down on the Brits was halted by Colt Cabana who sided with McGuinness and Brookside to take on Hero who he had wrestled the night before. The resulting 6-man tag match was one of the highlights of the night, if only for the crowd and the heel’s reaction to it. Several new derogatory chants (far too rude to print here) were introduced to ROH fresh from the local football terraces and Hero, Collyer and Castagnoli over-reacted to every one. After a great back and forth match which saw the heels focus on the veteran Brookside, Nigel McGuinnes secured the pin after a Tower of London DDT and lariat on Chad Collyer. The Brits celebrated in the ring while the Kings of Wrestling, snuck out through the back door. With many fans regarding the ROH vs. CZW feud as over after Cage of Death last month, this was a great way to bring in the Kings of Wrestling to ROH as the tag division could desperately do with some top tier heels now that the Embassy team of Alex Shelley and Jimmy Rave has been put on hold.

Before we could reach intermission, ROH champ Bryan Danielson returned to the ring and challenged SUWA to a match so he could get his revenge for the earlier attack. SUWA charged Danielson and the two brawled around the ring and out into the crowd. At some point here, Danielson’s head was cut open and this led to a much more bloody than usual ROH title match. With two heels battling away, the crowd were split between the two, however Dragon secured the win with a small package in a short, but very hard-hitting encounter. The main point of interest, other than Dragon’s head wound, was the amount of abuse Danielson was taking to his back from SUWA. Would this be an issue in the later title match against the ‘Messiah of the Backbreaker’ Roderick Strong?

Coming back from intermission, it was time for Prince Nana of the Embassy to address the crowd. After making several insulting comments about the ladies of Liverpool who he had spent the previous night partying with (which earned him more cheers than boos) it was time for the UK debut of the ‘Crown Jewel’ Jimmy Rave. Despite Nana’s threats on ROHvideos.com that the throwing of toilet paper would not be accepted, Rave was not going to be given a free ride by the UK fans. Streams of toilet roll, many of them a nice shade of pink pelted the ring and Rave and Nana sold any direct hits like they had been hit by a thunderbolt. Rave’s opponent was the UK’s own Doug Williams, who got a great reception for his ROH return. The subsequent match featured the usual Rave/Nana cheating, combined with Williams’ excruciating looking submission holds. The crowd was also all over Rave and Nana with the Ghanian dictator hamming it up at ringside. Williams earned the pin with a chaos theory and the Embassy were seranaded out of the building with a rendition of ‘na-na-na-na, hey, goodbye’.

With Aries and Strong out of action it was left to the Briscoes, Matt Sydal and Davey Richards to steal the show with their pre-main event tag match – and steal the show they did. If there is a better tag team in wrestling today than the Briscoe Borthers, than I have not seen them. They are so polished and their moves are so well executed that they should be huge stars in this business. It is such a shame that tag team wrestling has become such a dirty word in 2006 because these are two of the best in the world at tag team wrestling. Matt Sydal and Davey Roichards on the other hand are no slouches, with Sydal fresh off a tour of Japan with Dragon Gate and Richards coming of a highly praised match against KENTA at the last ROH show. Another slow-burner, this match was not as high flying as the Briscoes’ match with Sydal and AJ Styles and was not as hard hitting as their encounters with Strong and Aries, however this was as good an example of tag team wrestling as you could ask to see. By uniting Richards and Sydal, it allowed them to use their offence in short bursts, which made them all the more effective. The highlights of the match were an awesome corkscrew suicide dive from Richards and a Matt Sydal moonsault, both to the floor. After numerous near-falls that saw the crowd on their feet for every near three count, the Briscoes’ secured the pinfall on Sydal with a cutthroat suplex/leg drop combination (after eliminating Richards with a Jay driller), however all 4 men earned a standing ovation from the crowd. This is a match that, if put on in front of a US crowd, would earn rave reviews for it’s hard-hitting excellence, so let’s hope that either ROH repeat this match stateside or that, upon the show’s DVD release, it gets the admiration it’s due for being a quite fantastic tag team contest.

With wrestling that good, the main event had a lot to live up to, however the two men involved were more than capable of putting on an awesome main event. With the Strong vs. Danielson matches getting longer and more vicious the more times they face each other, the fans were expecting something special here and with the bell-time for the main event being a surprisingly early 9.00 could it be that we would see a 60 minute draw out of these two?

With Danielson having already wrestled once that evening and sporting a still bleeding head, the two started off at full-pace right from the bell. Whether it was Strong chasing Dragon for slapping him during the early exchanges in the corner or the flurry of chops and forearms that built in ferocity as the match went on, this was every bit as hard-hitting as their previous encounters. It was therefore, something of a surprise to see the match stopped at just over 20 minutes after a flurry of vicious MMA-style elbows from Danielson who subsequently locked in the cattle mutilation to the now unconscious Strong. Although not a classic as the previous three have been, this was certainly a worthy main event and continues the story of Danielson and Strong’s hard-hitting rivalry. The final image of a bloody Danielson (now beelding from his mouth as well as his head) standing over the equally bloodied Strong (who had been cut open above his eye) will surely add another level of competitiveness to this match-up, as well as a level of sporting realism that WWE simply cannot (or perhaps will not) match up to.

Overall verdict: B+
“A fantastic show, albeit slightly short in time and number of matches. Having said that, there was not a poor match on the show and it really showed off to the UK fans just what ROH is all about. Whether it is the hard-hitting action, innovative high-flying and tag team action, or simple good old-fashioned fun wrestling with heels you love to boo and babyfaces you want to cheer, it had the lot. Whether the matches will pass the test of time is unsure, however the two tag matches will certainly warrant another viewing on DVD. In short, ROH did everything they needed to do to send the fans home happy and the news that they will be returning to the UK in March next year will certainly help make up for any short comings this show might have had.”