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Thursday, January 22, 2009

My Weekly TNA Catch-up, Impact 22nd Jan 09

4 Way X Division Championship Match - Sonjay Dutt vs Sheik Abdul Bashir vs Chris Sabin vs Alex Shelley. I'm exactly sure why Dutt was getting a title shot here at all, its not like he's even in line or was in the top 5. Just to reiterate the last time they did a proper ranking tournament. Turning Point PPV Nov 08, X Division Ranking Match. Top 10 rankings were as follows:- 10th - Sonjay Dutt. And after that? Impact 18th Dec 08, X Division Championship Quarterfinals - Sonjay Dutt vs Chris Sabin, Sabin took the win.
So Dutt shouldn't be anywhere CLOSE to being a f**king contender, let alone getting this title shot. Shelley & Sabin were introduced vocally as different people but the graphics department is still stubbornly billing them as The Motor City Machineguns. Unsurprisingly this was more a tag match than a 4 way. Dutt & Bashir were keeping Shelley out of the ring and doubleteaming Sabin and the excessive use of pyro made things a bit smoky and the action wasn't always easy to see. I guess WWE aren't the only people who don't use air conditioning either. Shelley got the eventual win with a weird forward roll-up on Dutt.
Pointless backstage c**p between Booker T & Shane Sewell. MEM come to the ring and bore us on the mic. Cornette books a 4 way between Sting, Angle & Team 3D for the next PPV. We also get a quick shot of Team 3D who recently won the IWGP Tag Titles in Japan on the 2nd Global Impact Tour.
Knockout Match - Sojourner Bolt vs ODB. Bolt took advantage of ODB's intro to the crowd to jump her from behind and get on top. This was a pretty decent and quite even match between Bolt & ODB until some idiot (Russo I assume) sent Kong down to do a run-in which resulted in a DQ on Bolt by outside interference with ODB taking the win & predictable and utterly c**p & pointless beatdown.
Tag Elimination Match - Booker T & Scott Steiner vs Petey Williams & Eric Young. If you get pinned or submit then you get eliminated and it becomes a handicap match. Petey is still wearing the Steiner gear but has retaken his Maple Leaf Muscle nickname dropping the Lil' Petey Pump nickname. The MEM here were hoping to take out Young then beatdown Williams, he and Young should have worked well together as they used to tag as part of Team Canada back in the early years of TNA. Williams & Young sold well for Booker & Steiner but Booker took out Young with the axe kick leaving Williams in a rather predictable handicap match.
Williams bumped heavily for Booker but hit a great Tornado DDT on Steiner. Booker T took the eventual win using the Axe Kick off Williams. Sewell's business with Booker & Steiner was pointless, we expect to see him gone after that. He was already on his last chance or beyond it, not even the greenest mark will believe him still being employed as either referee or wrestler by TNA after this. Although we really also should see fines or suspensions for both Booker & Steiner for assaulting a TNA official regardless of who started it or how it started.
Non-title 1st Blood Tag Match - Matt Morgan & Abyss vs Beer Money. Not a great match made worse by the Morgan swerve hitting Abyss with the chair which really should have been expected. Beer Money got the win after Morgan got his revenge for last week and I guess this tagteam is now over and Morgan is now a heel?
Tables Match - Kurt Angle vs AJ Styles. Styles was always going to be the better and more interesting worker here, Angle made a great flub where he cut his hand closing a table to bring it to the ring. The cameraman had bad positioning when Angle & Styles traded punches showing Angles best hitting nothing but air. The same camerman compounded his mistake a few minutes later by showing Styles flying forearm also hitting nothing but air, they really need to fire this guy as he's been f**king up quite a lot as of late.
I'm not sure if it was the same camera that no-sold AJ's Pele (no, that was one of the guys at ringside so some of the blame there has to be placed on the directors head and I hope he'll also be looking for a new employer after this?) but after a decent match mainly run by Styles Angle took the win off the Angle slam through the table. The post match beatdown was pointless and Angle making his "end of TNA" speech is utterly pointless and stolen from WCW's NWO era. And look how well that worked for WCW.

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