Ring of Fire: The Wheel Turns

[Phantom Stranger]

ROF: European Showcase
Sunday Week 1 January 2013
Parc des Sports (Mediterranean Europe)
4526 in attendance
RATING: 0.45

vs.
Huntress Makiko vs. Jaime Quine for the ROF Womens Championship
Well, as a first televised womens' title defence for Makiko this was not great, shame, but there it is. We've been working dark battle royals for a while; every so often it's worth testing out combos in one-on-one matches. The Makiko Clutch carried the day after a spirited quarter-hour that I think would have gone better if the two women were better respected in Paris at this point.
Huntress Makiko defeated Jaime Quine by submission
RATING: C

The show then kicked up a gear; a recap of Tuesday's events surrounding the main eventers yielded a very nice reaction from the European crowd.
RATING: B

w/ vs.
British Samurai vs. KC Glenn for the ROF TV Championship
KC Glenn, the hot young prospect. British Samurai, the most respected TV champion in ROF history – and one of our better wrestlers. It's the kind of story that writes itself, and it's an ROF kind of story; all you need is two wrestlers and a motivation for them to fight each other. KC and Sammy both seem to be pulling out new tricks, even at this stage in Sammy's career, and that helps things substantially. It went back and forth for nearly fourteen minutes, but in the end an attempted full nelson was broken and Sammy spun around and landed the fisherman's suplex to keep KC down for the pin. At least the crowd's properly warmed up now.
British Samurai defeated KC Glenn by pinfall
RATING: B


We'd had time since Tuesday. A quickie hype video aired next for Don Henderson/Human Arsenal for the title. If they'd worked together more in the past, this would have had more of the right kind of footage, but the pop was OK nonetheless.
RATING: B-

vs.
Los Leyendas vs. The Disrespected
Los Leyendas have the home field advantage, so to speak; they were briefly shining lights in our old European tag division, and while Chojiro of the Disrespected also spent time in Europe, Keith Adams never has had much success over there. They do their best here, battling hard, but Chojiro has his father's mannerisms in a lot of places and some new tricks of his own, and Keith Adams is Old Reliable in a lot of ways. Eventually the Kitoaji Lariat flattened El Leon and the three count got a good solid response.
The Disrespected defeated Los Leyendas when Chojiro Kitoaji pinned El Leon
RATING: B

vs. vs. w/
El Heroe Mexicano vs. Ernest Youngman vs. Steve Flash
More or less the mirror of Tuesday's match; the tag partners of that triple threat set out to prove themselves. With El Heroe not on the ball and Steve's age limiting the time we could work this, it really wasn't as good a match as it might have been, but it was nonetheless an enjoyable back-and-forth building up to Ernest levelling both rivals with The Hit before pinning Steve for the three. This time, then, the tag champs come out on top.
Ernest Youngman defeated El Heroe Mexicano and Steve Flash when he pinned Steve Flash
RATING: B-


Something a little different here; a pre-taped interview featuring Jonathan Faust answering my questions while wrestling – and dominating – a warm-up match against a CPW developmental talent borrowed for the purpose. It fell more than a little flat...
RATING: E+

vs.
Art Reed vs. Jonathan Faust
Well! As I've already said, Art is a dependable, valuable worker with a massively wide skillbase. It looks like Faust is stepping up his game as a result; maybe their work together on the house shows has helped him pick up a few new tricks, but he was definitely looking a lot sharper in the ring, which got the crowd very happy and meant that the Devil's Drop putting Art down actually got a good reception. Faust may have started to trigger a second wind...
Jonathan Faust defeated Art Reed by pinfall
RATING: B+


Another hype video ran next, focusing on a lot of the top players in the upcoming Commonwealth Cup tournament and putting the cup itself over. Decent but not great pop.
RATING: C+

vs.
Joss Thompson vs. UK Dragon
Not long left for the main event, but two very, very reliable main eventers are generally a good response to that issue, and so it proved here, as Joss and Dragon stepped up to the challenge and went for it, providing a good, entertaining match in under seventeen minutes culminating in a Clean Cutter attempt being caught and twisted into a Dragon Driver to give the former champion the win.
UK Dragon defeated Joss Thompson by pinfall
RATING: B+

Not bad, all told. We kept our momentum ticking over, for one thing.
OVERALL: B