5 Ups & 5 Downs From WWE SmackDown (2 Jan - Results & Review)

4. An All-Action 8-Woman Tag

IYO SKY, Rhea Ripley, Charlotte Flair and Alexa Bliss beat Asuka, Kairi Sane, Nia Jax and Lash Legend in a fun 8-woman tag effort that kept the energy high and was actually way better than the women's WarGames match at Survivor Series. Nah, yours truly will never miss a chance to rake WWE over hot coals for that lame duck double ring cage match.

After this finish, one can see a title change coming a mile off on Monday’s Raw. Rhea and IYO will surely topple The Kabuki Warriors, then Ripley and SKY will probably have Nia and Lash waiting for them afterwards. Charlotte and Alexa too. Michael Cole and Corey Graves hyped up Legend loads during this bout for a reason though, and it's interesting that Flair and Bliss were handed the jobber entrance treatment despite their star power.

Maybe their union won't last too much longer then.

The match was a great watch anyway, and it feels like the babyfaces winning was the correct call. SmackDown's live crowd went positively banana (trademark: Pat Patterson) for the finish. There's no denying that Ripley has cooled off as a must see character since this time last year, but her team with IYO is popular enough to work.

Again, this is the bout that should've happened at Survivors. WWE need to start learning lessons about what happens when they shoehorn combos into major gimmick scenarios just for the sake of it. These women didn't need all of the extra bells and whistles. Their story didn't merit it, and they were perfectly fine simply wrestling a straight up 4v4 tag.