McXal's Reviews

As the countdown continues to Final Battle 2019, this week we move our attention to the notorious Honor United 2019 UK Tour. The triple-shot weekend featured injuries, controversies and some of the worst crowds (in terms of size) for any Ring Of Honor show in their 17+ years of existence. Since this is television (and it took place in York Hall which probably had the biggest of the three crowds that weekend), our feature bout from the Honor United Tour sees Shane Taylor defend the TV Title against the UK's own Joe Hendry. Quinn McKay and Ian Riccaboni are your hosts...

The show opens hot with extended highlights of the Rush vs Jeff Cobb World Title Match in Bolton. Rush won there, meaning we're able to confirm the Final Battle main event, where he will defend against PCO.

Next we get a spotlight on the antics of Jay Lethal and Jonathan Gresham across the three nights of the Honor United Tour. Lethal shocked everyone by attacking the Briscoes with a chair (in London) and affirming his agreement that he and Gresham are right to win matches or advance their careers by any means necessary (since everyone else does) during a live promo in Newport, they finally went to Bolton where the Briscoes issued the challenge for a Tag Title Match at Final Battle. 

Highlights of Kelly Klein's WOH World Title defence against Mandy Leon in London air next. Ian then runs down all of the 'exciting new talent' that ROH presented over that weekend in the UK - as a set-up for highlights of the thrilling Flamita vs Mike Bailey bout from Night Three.

Shane Taylor and Joe Hendry deliver simultaneous promos ahead of the main event. Both are really good; Joe is as intense as we've seen him and talks about flying to an ROH try-out camp looking for a job even when he was broke because he believes in himself so strongly, whilst Taylor relishes the thought of a big match in a hostile atmosphere and wants to destroy a UK hero on home soil. His promo is sullied somewhat by the fact that he clearly has no idea what a Proving Ground Match is...and nobody cared enough when editing this together to avoid putting his failure to understand the rules on television...

The Prestigious One earned this title shot the hard way (whilst Taylor was giving out title matches to local jobbers like sweets); taking Taylor to a time-limit draw in a Proving Ground Match during the Global Wars Espectacular Tour. He now receives his title shot in the UK, in a building he has performed in many times previously. Can he end Shane T's dominant reign? His partner/rival Dalton Castle crashes commentary for this match. Hendry's entrance included a Shane Taylor Promotions spoof themed around the original UK version of 'The Office'...but I presume it was cut for copyright reasons. I fully understand that; but comedy entrances are a HUGE part of Hendry's gimmick. If they can't even put them on TV what is the point of signing him? He will really struggle to get over if you take away such a massive part of his act. (I double checked, and it's been cut from the Honor Club VOD version too).

Taylor seems to grow in confidence with every match, and Hendry smartly tries to lock him up and cling to him in a way to negate his size and striking power. He successfully forces the champ into a wrestling match rather than a fight and that is where Hendry has a pronounced advantage. Shane starts trash-talking the challenger, and smiles broadly as he goads Joe into trading shoulder tackles with him (since he is easily able to win that exchange). It provokes Hendry to quicken the pace, cause the champ to gasp for air with some World Of Sport trickery...and then drive Taylor to the floor with a tackle. But now Joe makes a critical mistake and tries to follow Taylor to the outside. Shane capitalises instantly with a TOWER OF LONDON OFF THE APRON! He batters Hendry outside the ring then almost takes his head off with a leg drop on the apron. It now means that when Joe tries to get back in the ring and wrestle Shane the champ is able to brush him away and paste him to the canvas with a reverse elbow. He then escorts back to the outside for some violent heaves into the guardrails. He keeps doing it, until finally Joe reverses one and throws Taylor THROUGH the guardrails! FANS HIT THE DECK TOO! The courage Joe showed there was enough to even get some praise out of Dalton Castle on commentary...but his hope is quickly extinguished with a brutal lariat from the champion. SUPLEX BY JOE! KNOCK-OUT PUNCH by Taylor! Joe somehow resists defeat and levels Shane T again with a Codebreaker. He trades strikes with Taylor...which proves to be ill-advised as Shane almost caves in his face with a knee strike. Package Piledriver gets 2! Second rope splash nailed...but still Joe won't be pinned. FREAK OF NATURE ON TAYLOR! GETS 2! HENDRY LOCK! Taylor rolls through, but Hendry counters Greetings From 216 back to the Hendry Lock. With his last burst of strength Shane boots his way free and hits GREETINGS FROM 216! Taylor retains at 14:32

Rating - **** - In the building live I thought this was a good match, but found that the lack of crowd heat (particularly in the first half) hurt it. Watching it back on TV really allowed me to appreciate the finer detail of what they were doing though and this was great. Easily Hendry's best ROH match, and one of Taylor's best bouts of 2019 too. The opening half of the match, which live I found heat-less, was SO smart. Both competitors continually came up with strategies to negate what their opponent was trying to do. Hendry wanted to grapple Taylor...so Shane pissed him off and got him to try tackles. Joe recognised his lower body weight made that a challenge, so he blew Taylor up THEN tackled him to the floor. But out there Taylor came into his own and pulverised Joe, delivering such a vicious beating that Hendry never fully recovered. All of that made Joe's performance in the closing stages of the match all the more remarkable. Despite being heavily wounded on the floor, Hendry found the fortitude to brawl with him outside, trade strikes inside...and even the power to hit an incredible Freak Of Nature. An outstanding match for free television.

Tape Rating - N/A - Despite offering absolutely nothing new for those of us who watched the full Honor United shows, I actually quite liked this episode. It did an effective job of capturing all the key developments from an entire triple shot weekend of live events and for the most part did a clever job hiding how sparse and dead the crowds were (mostly by limiting the amount of footage from the Newport show to about thirty seconds). Putting Taylor/Hendry as the feature bout over Rush/Cobb was a big call, but one I am completely on board with.