Speaking of great heel acts that were neutered in 2015, no man epitomises this better than the Bulgarian Brute, Rusev. His debut year in 2014 saw him go undefeated and pick up the United States Championship in the process, and when he was the runner up to Roman Reigns in the Royal Rumble it seemed like he would continue to establish himself as a major player in the upper echelons of World Wrestling Entertainment. Then John Cena happened. Continuing the theme of WWE squashing the momentum of potential superstars, Rusev was made to look toothless by Cena in match after match. Losing to Cena is no real source of shame though, and Rusev could have been forgiven for thinking the future still looked bright. What came next was a rushed break up with his valet, Lana, and what was objectively the worst storyline of the year in WWE. Rusev and Lana became embroiled in a love quadrangle with Dolph Ziggler and Summer Rae, a feud that benefited nobody and made all four look like fools continuously. The story didn't even truly end. When news of Rusev and Lana's real life engagement came out, the two were quickly reunited on WWE TV. An entire years worth of build for the Super Athlete was undone before 2015 was out. Rusev now stands as another irrelevant name in the middle of the card.
Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.
