WWE Raw house show report
April 14, 2011
Belfast, N. Ireland
By William Cully, PWTorch reader

It was a good crowd and was very close to sold out. I went with my future wife, Laura, and the show started on time. All matches were the usual length. The U.S. Title and Orton-Punk matches might have been slightly longer than usual.

(1) Evan Bourne beat Alex Riley. Good opening to the show. Riley played heel brilliantly and had the crowd booing him out of the building several times. Bourne included all his usual offensive spots and won with his usual Air Bourne.

(2) Percy Watson beat Tyson Kidd. Decent match. The crowd wasn't very into it really, but Percy looked improved from NXT.

(3) Santino & Kozlov beat the Usos. The Usos cut a promo on Santino being on his own, referring back to Kozlov being attacked at WrestleMania. They said Santino is dumb for starting on his own. The match was mainly about Santino trying to overcome the odds and he was down and out several times. The Usos looked like a really polished tag team. Ten minutes into the match, Kozlov's music hit and he sprinted to the ring leading to a comeback. Really good surprise!

(4) John Morrison beat Dolph Ziggler. To be honest, I was bored, as it looked like the same match seen all the time between these two.

(5) Divas champion Brie Bella beat Eve Torres.

(6) Randy Orton beat C.M. Punk in a Street Fight. It was a fan's choice match and the other option was two-out-of-three falls. The match was good, but slow at times. They used a cane, chair, steps, and briefly brawled into the crowd. Good match. Both wrestlers brought it, even if it were a house show.

R-Truth and Melina came out to the crowd and held a contest to bring a competition winner backstage. They held a dance-off. A kid won. The rest were adults. R-Truth was really into it.

[Intermission]

(7) Sin Cara beat Primo. Primo played heel really well and talked about how Sin Cara was just as good of an international star as he is. Really good heel work as he was taunting kids, too. Sin Cara came out to a decent ovation. During the match, he had them all sucked in. His spots were perfect, including several high-caliber arm drags and huracanranas that had the crowd cheering. Good match. Better than the one on Raw. It's apparent he isn't used to the WWE style, though, as he his selling isn't great.

(8) U.S. champion Sheamus beat Daniel Bryan. Bryan came out as babyface as the crowd assumed that it was the norm. Sheamus came out to a big ovation and was clearly babyface for this evening due to the Irish connection. Bryan was a great heel slipping in and out of the ring and taunting the crowd from the outside. Sheamus didn't get a lot of offense in and was making his comeback. Sheamus then Irish-whipped Bryan into the corners three times and each time the ring actually moved! Both guys worked really hard. Sheamus won with a Brogue Kick to Bryan's head on the outside, then he got in the ring and delivered another one for the finish. Awesome match!

(9) John Cena beat WWE champion The Miz via DQ; Miz retained the WWE Title. This opened wiht a typical promo from Miz and Riley recapping Mania. Once the match began, Cena and Miz had equal offense. Riley then interfered, causing the DQ.

Post-match: Miz and Riley attacked Cena before R-Truth ran down to help. They cleared the ring and Cena hit his spots. Cena then cut a promo and shook Truth's hand. He said "Truth is true to the championship." Cena then hung out until the crowd was almost gone.

I thought it was a great show and the best house show I've been too in several years. The younger guys seem to be getting more confident.

Biggest Pops:

(1) Cena
(2) Sheamus
(3) Randy Orton

Biggest Heat:

(1) Miz
(2) C.M. Punk
(3) Dolph Ziggler

[Torch art credit Grant Gould (c) PWTorch.com]

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