It’s the one night of the year where every WWE Championship is defended, get ready for Clash Of Champions 2020! It’s a stacked card, and it’ll be hard to not see someone win gold tonight. Matches like Randy Orton vs. Drew McIntyre, Jey Uso vs. Roman Reigns, and AJ Styles vs. Sami Zayn vs. Jeff Hardy alone could make this a tempting card, but can WWE deliver on this potentially great card?
WWE SmackDown Tag Team Title Match: Cesaro & Shinsuke Nakamura (c) vs. The Lucha House Party
The kickoff match for this show, Cesaro & Nakamura look to define their championship reign and put Lucha House Party behind them finally. Before the match, it’d be decided that it would be Lince Dorado & Kalisto in this one for the Lucha House Party.
A fairly standard tag team match, with the champions isolating Lince Dorado for the first half of the match, but with a fast paced finishing stretch where Lucha House Party looked close to a win. Nakamura would dump Dorado over the barricade. Cesaro & Nakamura retained after the Swing into Kinshasa.
Match Rating: 2.75/5 (** 3/4)
WWE Intercontinental Title Triple Threat Ladder Match: Jeff Hardy (c) vs. AJ Styles vs. Sami Zayn
When Sami Zayn showed up with his Intercontinental Championship that he never lost, you knew things were gonna explode with current champion Jeff Hardy. Add in AJ Styles, who felt cheated in how he lost the title, and some ladders? You’d get chaos!
Everyone would be battered and bruised by the end, with Zayn often being in the perfect position to avoid disaster. Hardy being a daredevil cost him certain victory but made a memorable moment, taking out Zayn briefly before brawling with Styles.
Zayn got back up and grabbed two sets of handcuffs from his jacket, putting one through the stretched part of Hardys ear and stuck him to the ladder. He’d cuff himself to Styles to prevent him from climbing the ladder, before freeing himself with the key and cuffing Styles halfway up the ladder, and grabbing the championships! Sami Zayn is champion once again!
It was a creative as hell ladder match, which got a ton of time to play out likely due to other scrapped matches. These three built a great one, one of the best WWE matches of the year.
Match Rating: 4.5/5 (**** 1/2)
WWE RAW Women’s Title Match: Asuka vs. Zelina Vega
Asuka has renewed her dominance on the RAW Women’s Championship, but she has a new challenger in Zelina Vega. Vega is done managing Andrade & Angel Garza as they try to claim Championships, and is going for gold herself. No one feels she has a chance to beat Asuka, but anything can happen.
This was a fine match, Asuka helped Vega look like a legitimate threat, with Vega targeting the arm and working it over. However, Asuka just needed to apply the Asuka lock for mere seconds, and it was over. Not a bad first showing for Zelina, but not champion material yet. A cheap shot after the match sets up a future rematch.
Match Rating: ⅖ (**)
WWE United States Title Match: Bobby Lashley (c) vs. Apollo Crews
Apollo Crews has clashed with The Hurt Business for months now, and at Payback? Lashley took his United States Championship. Now Crews wants it back, but will he win the rematch?
Once again it was the power of Lashley against the speed of Crews. Crews had a nice segment of control in the middle of the match, even getting him up for a Military Press and hitting a frog splash. Lashley would get control however, lock in the Hurt Lock and successfully defend his Championship.
Match Rating: 2.5/5 (** ½)
WWE RAW Tag Team Title Match: The Street Profits (Angelo Dawkins & Montez Ford) (c) vs. Andrade & Angel Garza
The Street Profits are enjoying a long reign as RAW Tag Team Champions, but it’s do or die for Garza & Andrade. Zelina Vega gave up on them, but a big win tonight could get her back.
This matchup is always good, just very tired. There wasn’t much new ground for them to cover, unless Garza & Andrade were on the same page, and became a deadly unit once again. Thankfully, that’s exactly what happened for the bulk of this match! This teamwork combined with their individual strengths took Street Profits to their limits, until Dawkins planted Andrade for the pin, but it was a dusty finish. Andrade kicked out, but the officials’ call was final. This was done due to Garza being potentially injured.
Match Rating: 3.25/5 (*** ¼)
WWE SmackDown Women’s Title Match: Bayley (c) vs. Asuka
With Bayleys original opponent Nikki Cross not medically cleared, the status of her title defense tonight was unclear. An open challenge was opened. Someone would have to step up, but who? RAW Women’s Champion, Asuka!
For something thrown together at the last moment, this would have been a great match, by virtue of the talent involved. But it didn’t last long, as Bayley hit Asuka with a chair for a DQ. Sasha Banks attacks Bayley afterwards, this all being more of an angle than anything.
Match Rating: 1/5 (*)
WWE Title Ambulance Match: Drew McIntyre (c) vs. Randy Orton
For months now, Orton & McIntyre have clashed over the WWE Championship. They’ve punted and claymore’d each other, and sent each other to the hospital. What better way to end this one than an Ambulance match!
It was an absolute clusterfuck in the best way. They brawled through the arena, past victims of Orton made appearances with Big Show, Christian & Shawn Michaels getting some revenge, plenty of fighting on the Ambulance and more. McIntyre rallied back after an RKO, nailed the Claymore, a punt kick and closed the door on this feud.
This is a hard match type, but these two did great making this one a fun match.
Match Rating: 3.75/5 (*** ¾)
WWE Universal Title Match: Roman Reigns (w/Paul Heyman) (c) vs. Jey Uso
It’s cousin vs. cousin, as Jey Uso looks to capitalize on his first ever World Title match. Reigns doesn’t care about family in this situation, he’s not letting that cloud his judgment in a title match. If Jey Uso wants to be the big dog? He needs to wrestle the match of his life, against the most dangerous Roman Reigns we’ve ever seen.
This match was one-sided from the start, a platform for Roman Reigns to show how far he is willing to go to remain champion. Jey Uso was outgunned from the start, in very deep over his head, but would get a brief pocket of control before being dropped with a Superman Punch.
Uso should have laid down, but he fought on, to the point where he almost got Reigns with a big splash off the top rope. Reigns low-blowed his cousin off the kick out, and had him beat with a spear but wasn’t done humiliating his cousin. Jimmy Uso came down to throw the towel in, but Jey didn’t want this. Reigns started to pummel Jey again, and the towel was thrown in, with Jimmy shielding his brother.
A well told story, some tense moments, and some great performances all led to this exceeding expectations. Paul Heyman has unleashed the monster within Reigns, and it’s unclear what can stop our Tribal Chief.
Match Rating: 4.25/5 (**** 1/4)
What was your favorite match or moment from Clash of Champions? Let us know what you think in the comment section down below.
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