5 Ups & 2 Downs From WWE SmackDown (Feb 9 - Results & Review)
Triple H puts The Rock in his place and Dakota Kai leaves Damage CTRL on a busy WWE SmackDown.
Thursday's explosive WrestleMania 40 press conference in Las Vegas was always going to be a tough act for this week's SmackDown to follow, so WWE leaned on Elimination Chamber qualifying. That wasn't the only tasty morsel Triple H let you chomp down on though - he also had major developments for Damage CTRL and a cracking number one contendership tag battle too.
If this was a functional show, then it was a damn good one.
Only one of the three Chamber qualifiers could be considered skippable, which is a real plus. The hard work was there, no doubt, but the women's side lacked some of the intrigue Drew McIntyre, AJ Styles, Randy Orton and Sami Zayn had. It's really as simple as that. They're joined in the 'Downs' section by a puzzling lack of self-awareness.
SmackDown opened with Trips reinforcing his grip on the WWE controls. He was flanked by top brand GMs Nick Aldis and Adam Pearce, and fired out a message to both Roman Reigns and The Rock ahead of their return to screens next week. Hunter's promo was a necessary piece of business, for the record.
Here's all the good and bad from Friday's latest!