10 NXT TakeOver: Portland Impulse Reactions
7. Finn Bálor Vs. Johnny Gargano
The pressure on Finn Bálor and Johnny Gargano was vast.
In a preview piece for this pay-per-view, your writer compared the worst case to a lowkey disaster from SummerSlam 1993 between Mr Perfect and Shawn Michaels. They had the job of just doing what they'd done with virtually every other wrestler, and a confusing lack of chemistry went hand in hand with bad booking to forge one of the year's biggest disappointments. With 'HBK' himself probably all over the presentation, this ended up a world away from such worries.
Bálor and Gargano ended up conducting the crowd in a way that actually enhanced the entire show rather than just their own match. There'd been concern in the build up that something would suffer the silence of the Portland natives as NXT put forth its biggest TakeOver ever, but this proved false. Instead, the fans gave patient attention to the gradual build in the early portions of this blinding battle.
'The Prince' was in scintillating and sinister form, finally re-finding himself as a heel despite the iron-forged relationship with the crowd. Gargano underplayed his own creeping aggravation, as if to foreshadow his callous act on the show later that night.