4 Ups & 4 Downs From Last Night's WWE SmackDown (Oct 31)
Ups...
4. Finally Getting It Right
Dolph Ziggler and Bobby Roode never really had the match the pair were probably capable of, but their two-out-of-three-falls show opener was a pleasing exhibition of each man's ability to draw a crowd into a match the old fashioned way.
Ziggler's not half as good as he thinks or says he is, but thrived in there with a technician as smooth as Roode. The race for falls early on played well on the cheap conclusions to their first two encounters, and the quick superkick for the first fall was a believable momentum stifler for 'The Glorious One'.
The sunset flip equaliser was a rare use of the move for an actual three-count, smartly subverting crowd expectation of Ziggler's kickout. From there, Roode went up the gears of his underrated babyface act, nailing his stunning spinebuster before both grabbed handfuls of trunks in last gasps before the eventual DDT victory for Bobby.
His post-match call to arms for SmackDown Live! didn't hold the weight of his ice cool NXT verbiage, but his next programme away from the enslavement of the battle of the brands will hopefully guide Roode into a sophomore success.