6 Ups & 4 Downs From WWE Raw (Results & Review - 9 Oct)

5. Viking Rules… Again

Kofi Kingston Ivar
WWE.com

Truthfully, it was foolish last week to caution against going back to the well too much with the ongoing New Day/Ivar feud. Somehow, this continues to hit every week, and Monday was no exception.

Kofi Kingston and Ivar weren’t able to replicate the magic of their singles match a few weeks back, but this was a completely different kind of battle – a plunder brawl that saw the two veterans use various tables, shields and flagpoles to their advantages. Despite having the weapons at their disposal, they strung together a really nice, cohesive match, with Valhalla and Xavier Woods making cameos.

Kofi executing a “beard mare” to yank Ivar off the top rope through a table on the floor was sublime. What else could you say about that? Ivar would get revenge, catching an attempted Trouble in Paradise and slamming Kofi through a table before flattening him with a moonsault for the win.

One would have to hope that booking Ivar this strongly is going to lead somewhere, because they’ve basically had him squashing a Hall-of-Fame act for a month now, and if WWE is going to trot him out there to lose to Drew McIntyre in 34 seconds, then that would be a colossal waste.

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Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.