The ECW Digest - 19th January 2010
19/01/2010
Hello and welcome the all new ECW Digest.
We’d love to know what you think to the new layout, or any other aspects of the Digest, so please feel free to get in touch via the Contact Us page, or any of the usual email addresses.
On with the show!
Quick Links
Opening Segment: The Abraham Washington Show with Kozlov
Match 1: Goldust & Tatsu Vs. Barretta & Croft
Segment 2: Ryder’s Big Announcement
Main Event: Christian Vs. William Regal
The ECW Digest
Segment 1
The Abraham Washington Santino Marella Show with Vladimir Kozlov
Tony Atlas introduces the Abraham Washington show with a slight difference tonight.
Abe is otherwise engaged tonight, but rather than cancel the segment, Santino is filling in.
Atlas announces that Santino’s guest tonight will be ‘Vladimir CostCo’. I still haven’t worked out if that was a mistake or on purpose.
Santino makes his grand entrance, looking rather suave in a cream suit.
He explains that Abe has intestinal gastroenteritis, or something along those lines, sending Atlas into fits of laughter.
Santino explains that Tony is in fact an Italian name, then makes the Hall of Famer repeat some Italian words before bringing out Kozlov.
I’ve got a feeling this will be a weak attempt at making Kozlov likable, we’ll see how it goes.
Santino says that it was very important for him to have a fellow immigrant as a guest tonight, and as Christian, Yoshi Tatsu and Khali were all unavailable, he got stuck with Kozlov.
He says he also wanted someone the crowd didn’t like so much, so he didn’t get shown up on his first try at hosting.
Kozlov agrees that people don’t like him too much, then explains that is because he got in with a bad crowd.
Not The Ruthless Roundtable however, but a Ukranian Biker Gang, which he was apparently leader of for ‘three beautiful years’.
Atlas burst into fits of laugher as Kozlov explains that he left the gang because someone ran over his face, but The Moscow Mauler soon shut him up, barking that it was no joke.
Next Kozlov blamed the Rocky movies for the people’s animosity towards him, saying many people mistake him for Ivan Drago.
By this point the crowd were clearly not going for it, and began heckling randomly, only cheering at the mention of cheese fries and Walmart.
Santino tells Kozlov they have a lot in common, and should become a tag team.
Kozlov refuses and Santino’s attempts to draw support from the crowd fail, as they boo the idea.
Santino’s constant pestering angers The Moscow Mauler, and the temporary host decides to bring an early close to the show before he gets slammed through the set.
Match 1
Tag Team Match
Goldust & Yoshi Tatsu
Vs.
Trent Barretta & Caylen Croft
If I hear Byron say ‘They prepare for matches by playing Guitar Hero’ one more time, I’m going to go over to the States and wrap a GH Controller around his head.
Who gives a crap how they warm up for matches? We don’t get told how DX warm up, we don’t get told how The Hart Dynasty warm up, we don’t get told how Legacy warm up, so why these guys.
Goldust and Tatsu showed arguably better teamwork during this match, which can’t be a good thing for Barretta and Croft, who are meant to be the more ‘established’ team, despite not being around as long.
I do quite like these guys though.
They look like something I’d create on Smackdown about 7 years ago, when I’d spend ages designing one guy, then just clone him and change the colours of his attire to make a tag team.
This was a good bout with two very strong tag team performances, but it was the underhanded tactics of the young upstarts that decided the result.
Goldust looked like wrapping things up, but Croft and Barretta turned it around and snatched a 3 count to continue their tag team roll.
I’ve a feeling we’ll see these four go again some time in the future.
Trent Barretta & Caylen Croft win by Pinfall.
Segment 2
Ryder’s Big Announcement
Apparently, according to Matt Striker at least, Zack Ryder has a huge announcement to make tonight, so let’s find out what it is.
Once in the ring Ryder says that as he’s beaten Dreamer and The Hurrican over the past few weeks, he wants everyone to refer to him as the ‘Heart and Soul Superhero’ of ECW.
He forces the ring announcer to introduce him in such a manner, then chews her out when she doesn’t do it with enough emphasis.
She does it again, much better, but Rosa Mendes clearly doesn’t think she put enough effort in and starts shouting in her face, looking more and more like something out of the Muppets with every syllable.
While this is going on The Hurricane hits the ring and takes Ryder out with a flying cross body, sending The Long Island Loudmouth fleeing from the ring with Rosa following closely behind.
Hmm, I see why that was classed as a huge announcement. It was almost as ground-breaking as John Cena’s announcement that he’d be in the Rumble, 20 minutes after Michael Cole had already revealed it.
Don’t forget you can vote for your favourite Superstar/Team of 2009 by clicking the banner below!
Cast your vote now!
Main Event Match
Singles Match
Christian
Vs.
William Regal (w/Ezekiel Jackson)
Now I know I said their match on Superstars was well worthy of it’s main event status, but I’m not sure I want to see the exact same match less than a week later.
In fact, this is exactly the reason why I’m considering putting an end to the Superstars Recap.
It’s like they just try things out on there to see how well they work, then if it goes well they put it on one of the ‘Big 3′ shows.
If there’s anyone out there who would like to try their hand at writing up Superstars each week please check out the ‘Jobs Page‘. It’d be a great opportunity for a wrestling fan who’s looking to get into writing.
This match got a HUGE chunk of the card to go, but I just couldn’t find myself getting as interested in it as I did when they met on Superstars last week.
Regal had numerous chances to pick up the win, but each time Christian was able to avoid losing the match and eventually picked up the momentum himself.
Just as it looked like the ECW Champion might be closing in on a win Jackson jumped into the ring and did the damage.
After the bell Regal hit Christian with the Knee Trembler before Jackson planted him with the Modified Urinagi.
The show finished with Jackson delivering a second Urinagi to Christian’s prone body.
As a stand-alone match, it was a superb performance from both men. However, being so close to the previous meeting made it all feel a little too familiar, which is a shame.
Christian wins by Disqualification.
