NXT UK Power Rankings: The Champ Proves It

For the first time in 80 weeks NXT UK had fans in the building and boy did they get a treat! The main event was yet another “Match of the Year” contender so I’m not even going to waste time. Here’s this week’s rankings! 

Honorable Mention: Teoman: He got a spooky package where he revealed that it’s his fault the numbers game got the best of him but that his family will be growing soon. 

5: Jordan Devlin: Devlin finally got those hooligans from Gallus out of the equation when they busted in on him in Sid Scala’s office and Jordan revealed he got a rematch with Joe Coffey with Wolfgang and Mark banned from ringside. It’s about time! It seems like I’m supposed to root for Gallus but I can’t fathom why. These are bad guys who do bad things. Just bullies. The whole lot of them. Jordan is doing God’s work. He also got a great jab in at the end when he said Joe has had two cracks at the title and come up short but when Devlin got a title match on a TakeOver he left with the belt. 

4: Sha Samuels: Sha was in his Big Daddy V tribute gear going shirtless with suspenders and he made the former King Mabel proud by beating “Flash” Morgan Webster by countering a springboard into a spinning spinebuster for the 3. He was nearly knocked off the list after eating a swanton off the top corner on to the floor from Webster and after somehow having Birthday Party decorations show up for his planned celebration of Dar winning the Heritage Cup #1 Contender Tournament but a win is a win so he stays. 

3: Blair Davenport: The scariest woman in all of NXT UK was a problem again tonight making relatively short work out of the woman who demanded Davenport’s reinstatement to have this match; Stevie Turner. Turner had a nice spot where she pulled off a version of the Three Amigos that saw her hit 3 neckbreakers in a row with rolls between them while never letting go. Davenport got the W in the end though with a V-trigger esque knee and a Falcon Arrow. After the match she said Scala did the right thing reinstating her and put the whole woman’s division on notice. 

2: A-Kid: If you’ve followed these at all you know I’m prone to giving spots to the losers of great matches. A-Kid fits that mold this week. This UK title match was an instant classic. The reversals, the psychology, the selling was all absolutely elite. In one match A-Kid left Dragunov’s arm worse for wear than Wolfgang’s was after being worked over in multiple tournament bouts. Savage and Steamboat, Taker and Shawn, Omega and Okada; sometimes guys just click. A-Kid and Dragunov are the latest pairing I’d add to that list. WATCH THIS MATCH!

1: Ilja Dragunov: Up is one of my all time favorite movies because of the montage early on where we don’t hear a word spoken but through clips and music we’re taken on an emotionally gut wrenching journey. Shel Silverstein is my all time favorite poet because he can evoke that same emotion with the most basic language. Despite my complete lack of brevity I believe there is true beauty in simplistic, thoughtful execution of a story or message. Dragunov v. A-Kid for the NXT UK Championship was exactly that. A-Kid had his leg destroyed over the coure of the match and Dragunov had his arm beaten to hell too. Sounds simple enough, right? But the little things made this brilliant. We saw Dragunov Matrix dodge a kick early on only to end up on the mat when he tried the same dodge later and his arm gave out. His arm gave out on the ropes when attempting his 619 set-up for his lariat sending him to the mat. At one point ge got A-Kid in a pin but couldn’t hook the leg with his bad arm. A-Kid handled his end of the selling fantastically too bridging only on one leg during one of his pin attempts. There were terrific reversal sequences too which started right out of the gate as A-Kid got stuck multiple times trying to kip-up out of a head scissors lock. All that is not to say we didn’t get high spots too! Dragunov nailed a gnarly looking leg wrench to send A-Kid off the top rope early on. Dragunov also hit a fisherman suplex type move off the top rope later in the match. Eventually Dragunov fought through sleeper, triangle and armbar attempts to get the win after a Torpedo Moscow to the leg and another to the head of A-Kid. I will repeat WATCH THIS MATCH!