Villanun

I respect the guy for remaining dedicated to Villa throughout some incredibly difficult personal times, but this was the right decision. Hope they've got someone else lined up and we can get them in quickly.

I'm not surprised he's going, didn't think he'd stay if we weren't promoted. I'd love to know what his influence was like in the dressing room; I suspect it was massive, and you can't put a price on that.

That was a wild swing, deserved a card.

Playing each other into trouble. This is sloppy stuff.

You beautiful bearded man!

I really dislike Bobby Madley.

Great tackle Jack!

Thank god for that!

Woodwork again. It's just not happening, is it?

10 minutes ago, Demitri_C said:

I've never seen such a negative team at villa park. Jesus

Rowett literally has parked the ferry

Us under McLeish?

Should have buried that, Conor.

Damn! So close.

13 hours ago, sharkyvilla said:

I've watched bits and pieces and the mixed tag match looked the best match of the night.  Really surprised how good Stephanie was, and I now get the hype about Rhonda Rousey.  Great to see Kurt back wrestling too, he's probably my all time favourite along with Jericho.

The match played well to Stephanie's strengths, letting her get some sneaky attacks in while accepting the fact that she's not a pro wrestler. Kurt looked better than he did in his Shield guest-spot, but he hasn't been particularly mobile in a while and honestly I worry for him every time he's in the ring. One of the things I thought the match did well was manage Angle's injuries while still making him look effective. Rousey meds more time to improve on the mic, but her fighting abilities were never in question. Yeah, this was one of my two matches of the night (the other being the Intercontinental title match).

23 hours ago, Demitri_C said:

You only have to look at NXT to see how well he is doing. The other obstacle is where does Shane fit into it? Surely he will a piece of the pie too. 

When the brand split first happened Smackdown was by far the better show, and when Raw improved and Smackdown worsened I heard it was because they moved some of the Smackdown writers across to Raw. Assuming that to be the case, I'd move thosr writers back to Smackdown and let Shane Captain that ship and give Raw to Trips. The McMahon kids have always had a problem with putting themselves over at the expense of wrestlers, so that could be a problem, but Trips seems to know how to build good matches regardless.

I enjoyed WM34 a lot more than I thought I was going to. Rollins-Balor-Mizz was always going to be great and they didn't disappoint; I think Rollins might well be Raw's most valuable player right now. The women's matches were all well wrestled, but I didn't like the end of the Flair-Asuka match at all. First they made Asuka look weak, and then they interrupted Charlotte's celebration to make it all about Cena. Rusev losing sucked, especially on Rusev Day - and wow, Randy Orton looks like he can barely be bothered any more. The booking on Reigns-Lesnar was awful, typical "make Roman look like superman" bullshit, so the ending came as a real surprise - and given the negative crowd reaction it wouldn't surprise me if the rumours about Vince calling an audible were completely true. Styles-Nakamura was a shock dud, although the heel turn might fire Nakamura's up a bit. And how close did they come to messing up Daniel Bryant's return? Way to massage your own ego, Shane.

But for me the real surprise was the mixed tag match. I was dreading it; watching two old men, one non wrestler and one debutant go at it was not a prospect I was looking forward to. What we got was a really entertaining, well paced match that told a coherent story and allowed everyone to play to their strengths. Rousey looked great on offence, and I particularly liked her "I'm just going to back in there and continue beating up your wife" line to Trips. If the stories about Trips taking a personal hand in this match's planning are true then it's only more proof that Vinny Mac should hand over the reins.

What a goal! When Grealish turns it on he really turns it on.

I missed the last few matches, but I'm sure glad I came back for this one.

Embarrassing, Hutton. Bad show.

Magnificent. I'm proud of the lot of them today, and Bruce in particular given the week he's had. VTID!

Only got to see the highlights, but what a performance! Amazing result. A word for that goal-line clearance - I know it's a cliche, but that really was good as a goal. More of the same please!

I can't quite believe what I'm hearing! New year, new Villa?

Some really bad passing from both sides.

Ref's a bit card-happy.

They're pressing Hutton pretty hard, must've identified him as a weak link.

Yet another super fun couple of hours watching the villa. I'm sick of this crap.