Saturday 11 March 2017

Learning to live with the Fastlane (result)


Right, its been a week and I figure anyone who wanted to see Fastlane either bought it on pay-per-view or has the WWE Network plus what I want to talk about is all over the internet so I feel safe writing this without a spoiler warning. Regardless, I want to go into the result of Goldberg/Owens so be aware.
Goldberg is Universal Champion and it is baffling. He won it in a main event match that officially ran for 22 seconds after some dicking about from Owens; in his current run with the company he has (according to Adam Blampied, whose job is to know these things) wrestled for exactly 108 seconds in singles matches and hit five moves.

He's fifty years old, which wouldn't necessarily be a problem if not for the fact that he's first “old guard” talent to win the Universal belt. Finn Balor was the inaugural champion, then he was injured and Owens picked it up thanks to interference from Triple H in a way that made it clear he was being anointed as the future of the company and H's new favourite now he and Seth Rollins are on the outs.

Unless they have one hell of a swerve coming, the only match for Goldberg at Wrestlemania that makes sense is Goldberg/Lesnar part three. Two part timers, one of whom is fifty and has yet to prove he can still put in a proper match and the other who just doesn't seem to care all that much about what he's doing anymore.

They're doing this when they could have had Kevin Owens facing Jericho in the main event and now that's going to be a non-title match. Its not even as if Jericho needed the heat from costing Owens the belt, the man has managed to get the audience invested in a scarf, a jacket covered in LED lights and a scarf, I feel certain he doesn't need help selling the fact he's pissed off with Owens.

And Owens... why take the title away from him now and like this? Owens is a fantastic talent who, if treated right, will be with the WWE for years to come. Goldberg is a fifty year old part timer who, let's face it, is pretty likely to drop the title at 'Mania and leave. I mean, it makes a kind of sense for Brock to win after two defeats, as much as him holding the Universal title thrills me even less than Goldberg having it.

Oh, and I'm just as baffled that they ended Charlotte's streak at Fastlane when they had the ref clearly see Sasha interfere in the match. They could have given Bailey a DQ victory and kept the streak intact for 'Mania.

Good grief, this was a weird show. 

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