6 Ups And 2 Downs From Last Night's NXT (16 Sep)

1. Championship's Scrambled

Not to be that guy but, this is a problem.

Battle Royal's are great fun. Giant multi-man matches where we get unusual pairings, spontaneous moments and, normally, outright carnage are one of the last pure joys in pro-wrestling but... they're also an admission. An admission that, logically and narratively, you don't really have any good options for your next title challenger.

Don't get me wrong, the Royal Rumble is baked into WWE's calendar and AEW have made the Casino Battle Royale work too, but these are lock-ins that you can build stories into, during and out of. Throwing together two of these things, at a weeks notice, for both the men's and women's championship, shows that right now NXT just has nothing going on.

No obvious challengers, no rising stars, no fan favorites, just a roster. As ever, the matches will be thrilling, the challengers worthy, and the title matches breathtaking, but the warning signs for declining interest are written on the f***ing walls now. Right now, NXT is still incredibly entertaining, but it doesn't feel remotely important. This needs to change, urgently.