3 Ups & 6 Downs From WWE NXT UK (6 May)

1. Seeing Red

This was odd. Ilja Dragunov and Dave Mastiff’s somewhat anticipated clash went just over one and a half minutes before the referee called it off. Dragunov had clocked Mastiff directly in the jaw with a stiff forearm, resulting in Mastiff sniffling blood out of his broken nose. The stiffness of this move wouldn’t look a step out of place on a New Japan show.

It’s a shame the match ended so abruptly, but in doing so, it made Dragunov look like a beast.

It helped that the Russian was on a different form here. He refrained from performing his usual arm-wailing entrance, instead entering with a menacing look. Well, a more menacing look than usual. He booted ‘The Bomber’ in the face right as the bell rang and stayed on the attack as much as possible. Dave only escaped by falling back to counter a sleeper hold attempt, flattening Ilja’s ribs.

Dragunov needs to move forward from the WALTER loss. A backstage promo later in the night indicated this, as he claimed he needs to change “now”. Aside from the match going so short through no fault of its own, this delivered in terms of advancing to the inevitable next chapter between them.