6 Ups & 3 Downs For AEW Collision (Dec 9 - Results & Review)
1. Excellent Wrestling, Excellent Larger Story
Andrade El Idolo is one of the very best wrestlers on the planet, an elite in-ring worker who effortlessly blends Rolls-Royce sheen with brutal crispness. Bryan Danielson is arguably the best wrestler on the planet, a timeless, special talent who's wrapping up another banner year of a truly legendary career.
This week's AEW Collision main event had all the ingredients to be special, and boy, did we get something special.
As one would expect, the in-ring work between Andrade and Danielson - bar one scary Bryan dive - was exceptional, but making all of this even more compelling is the various spinning plates of story development we got during and after this bout.
Of course, one key component to this contest was El Idolo tearing off the eye patch that's protecting the American Dragon's orbital injury and helping with his vision. From there, the former La Sombra upped his viciousness, targeting the bullseye that was Bryan's left eye and unleashing a relentless assault on that area before putting the wounded, weakened Danielson down with the hammerlock DDT. Fantastically adding to the drama and brutality of this situation, you had the commentary team calling for the match to be stepped, with even Nigel McGuinness joining in with those calls.
This match and all that surrounded it achieved so, so much.
- Andrade looks like a killer who'll do anything to win and now looks like a genuine threat to win the entire Continental Classic
- While not ringside, CJ Perry seems to have been a great influence on her new charge
- Bryan Danielson immediately becomes the compromised underdog in his remaining Continental Classic bouts, fighting against the odds to try and be the inaugural winner of this tournament
- How will this broken-down Bryan possibly fare against the monstrous Brody King when they face off in this tourney?
- Will fellow Blackpool Combat Club man Claudio Castagnoli take advantage of this obvious bullseye when he faces off against Danielson?
- And the impending Continental Classic meeting of Andrade and Claudio now has a whole added level of spice and personal issues to it
This was a magnificent main event to close out a Collision episode that was particularly strong when it comes to in-ring action, and Andrade vs. Danielson serves as yet another stellar outing for what is proving to be a very impressive tournament - with so many mouth-watering match-ups still to come for the Continental Classic.