WWE Raw Review 8/08/11 - Triple H To Referee Undisputed Title Match At Summerslam
Triple H announced that he would be the referee for the Punk/Cena clash at Summerslam this Sunday as the co-champions were restrained from violence during a heated contract signing.
THE BIG NEWS: Triple H announced that he would be the referee for the Punk/Cena clash at Summerslam this Sunday as the co-champions were restrained from violence during a heated contract signing. Triple H came out to start the show. He talked about the historical significance of this Sunday at Summerslam where co-champions John Cena and CM Punk will fight it out to become the Undisputed WWE title holder. He said that in order to guarantee that one man will walk out as undisputed champion the match requires a larger than life personality to make sure everything is handled smoothly and after an extended verbal self-appraisal he announced that he would be the special guest referee for the Summerslam main event. The new boss then announced that there would be a contract signing between Cena and Punk later on in the show after both men had been through some warm up challengers. He called out Cena to undergo his match first. John Cena arrived in the ring and in a nice authentic touch he engaged in a heated, mostly inaudible conversation with Hunter that was reminiscent of when you see football players arguing about something in the background on the pitch. The gist of it was that Cena thought Hunter's entrant as referee was a ploy to massage his ego whilst Hunter told him not to undermine the decisions he makes whilst in charge. This lent a shady atmosphere to the overall storyline and I hope these angles became a common staple of future feuds within the company. Match: John Cena defeated Jack Swagger via pinfall Lock up resulted in Swagger using his superior mat based ability to wrestle Cena to the ground. His mid-ring taunt was cut short though when he was hit by a massive clothesline from his recuperated opponent who then proceeded to knock the stuffing out of Swagger with a flurry of aggressive offensive. Swagger fought back at a crucial moment when he avoided Cena's dive into the corner and landed a sphere on his ankle to set up the ankle lock. Cena countered with the STF but whilst Swagger managed to power out of the submission he lay prone to Cena's move of dooms routine and a successful FU attempt. This wasn't the most fluid of affairs but it was great to see Cena bring some raw emotion to his offence and it was refreshing to see a match that didn't resort to the standard routine of having Cena utterly dominated before fighting back to capitalise in the end. ** ½ Interview with Alberto Del Rio backstage. He said that tonight's match with CM Punk will show what would have happened had the gutless Punk not ran away when he tried to cash in his Money in the Bank in Chicago. Elsewhere Truth cut a bizarre promo in which he made a tenuous link between spiders and John Morrison who he hoped to squish later on in the night. Rey Mysterio was supposed to wrestle The Miz but he was attacked by his scheduled opponent before the match could begin. Miz threw Rey against the stump of the WWE logo before being restrained by referees. He then strolled down to the ring and cut a venomous promo in which he stated that the current emphasis of Raw has all been about the title match when it should be all about him, the most must see champion in WWE history. He angrily stated that he didn't have a match booked for Summerslam in spite of all his media appearances and star value. He said that if he had to attack Rey Mysterio to get some attention then so be it. He then asked the referee to announce him as the winner of the match via forfeit but instead was handed a new opponent in Kofi Kingston. Match: The Miz defeated Kofi Kingston via pinfall (MATCH OF THE NIGHT) Really fine match. Kingston dazzled with high flying manoeuvres whilst Miz tried to knock his opponent down with concise, quick impact power moves. Back and forth action which saw a lot of countering and pin reversals and a tidy finish which saw Miz drop Kingston on the ropes and land the skull crushing finale for the win. *** CM Punk was interviewed backstage. He said that Hunter should not have got his nose (no pun intended) involved in the title match but couldn't help it because of his giant sized ego. He then claimed that the best thing for business would be him beating Cena at Summerslam. Match: CM Punk defeated Alberto Del Rio via pinfall Loud Punk chants during large portions of the match. Some good psychology at the start with Punk missing a vicious high kick, Del Rio smiling in the corner and Punk letting his opponent know how close he came to connecting. Del Rio worked Punk's arm quite methodically throughout the encounter including a really cool heel spot where Punk missed a dive into the corner and Del Rio climbed outside the ring and stretched Punk's arms against the ring post. Finish saw Del Rio attempt to lock in his crossarm bar submission but on this occasion Punk managed to land a kick to the back of Del Rio's head and then hit him with the GTS. Match was inexplicably under five minutes long which wasn't enough time to promote the champs skills or the money in the bank winner's potential threat to the main event scene but for the time allocated they both did a fantastic job. ** ½ Match: Beth Phoenix defeated Eve Torres via pinfall Expected a lot more from this clash which was extremely sloppy and full of obvious botches that was not becoming of the talent involved. It's always fun seeing Beth manhandle other Divas and Eve has some very eye catching kicks in her arsenal but everything that came between the moves was very clumsily orchestrated. In the end Beth thwarted Eve's moonsault attempt to set up her Lam Slam finisher. * Post-match Beth got on the mic and said that she was sick of Divas like Eve and Kelly Kelly what with their booty-popping and other such antics that are effectively damaging the Divas division. She was in the middle of saying how she was going to put a stop to it all when she was attacked from behind by Kelly Kelly who jumped inside the ring to tend to Eve. Match: Alex Riley defeated Dolph Ziggler via disqualification More of an angle than a match. Vickie was getting in Riley's face at the beginning and he got on the mic and complained about her breath. Vickie was obviously unable to take these comments in her stride because not even a few minutes into the bout and she came back inside the ring to give Riley another talking to and a hearty slap. This led to a disqualification and Riley pushing Ziggler into Vickie for good measure. ½ * Post-match Dolph and Vickie argued with Vickie walking out of the ring in a huff. Match: R-Truth defeated John Morrison via pinfall Fierce brawl to start with Truth getting the upper hand but Morrison firing back with clotheslines and aerial offence. They both engaged in an outside scrap with culminated in a wicked looking spot that saw Truth chop down Morrison's legs whilst he was stood on the security wall with his neck landing on the edge. Morrison just avoided being count out but his injured neck made him vulnerable for his opponent who exploited his injury before successfully connecting with his what's up finisher. Yet another loss for Morrison. ** ½ Backstage Christian was interviewed and said that Hunter should be present on Smackdown this Friday when he will have something very important to say no doubt regarding his match with Randy Orton. The ring was done up especially for the contract signing with Triple H and John Laurenitis stood side by side. Main Event Contract Signing: This went on forever. Don't get me wrong, there was an underlying sense of tension that gave the event a big time feel but there was so much plodding banter going back and forth that it began to become quite grating about midway through. In short, Punk, Cena and Triple H all accused of one another of being either phoney or gutless depending on who was talking to who. Punk played a clip of The Rock mocking Cena and saying that real men don't like him because they can see through his crap. Punk echoed these sentiments though Cena argued that there was nothing phoney about his loyal to his core audience though he appreciated that there is a group of people who will always hate his guts. He then turned the tables on Punk who had made several financial requests for his new contract despite claiming to be the down to earth voice of the voiceless. Eventually attention turned to the title itself with Punk adamant that he would prevail at Summerslam and Cena letting him know that if he doesn't then he will be remembered as nothing more than a one hit wonder. He wished Punk luck to which Punk retorted that luck is for losers and that he'd rather be remembered as a one hit wonder than as a phoney like his opponent. At this point Cena said they'd probably done enough talking and began clearing the table. Punk followed suit and the two men squared off. John Laurenitis came in between the two men with Punk kicking the back of his head whilst trying to get to Cena. In response Cena ended up pushing Hunter into Punk when trying to get to his rival. Hunter didn't like this one bit and got in Cena's face whilst restraining him lending some weight to the concept of his overinflated ego. Meanwhile Punk walked up the ramp and began shouting to Hunter about how the fix is in implying that the boss will be out to get him to Sunday. VERDICT: Even though five minutes of the long-winded contract signing segment could have put to better use in the Punk/Del Rio clash, the WWE deserve props for not allowing any physical contact to emerge between Punk and Cena in the build up to their match at Summerslam. In fact the final spot was sufficiently well done in teasing the violence but not actually pulling the trigger thus the anticipation for actually getting to see both men tangle on Sunday will be all the more sweeter. The inclusion of Triple H as referee also adds a further big time feel to the match and a sense of unpredictability in trying to determine how the new boss might behave in this role. It wasn't all perfect on Raw this week but the build to the money-making match has been very well booked and I am genuinely excited about seeing the top dogs tangle again at this weekend's PPV. SUPERSTAR OF THE NIGHT: John Cena The WWE poster boy suits his current serious role to perfection and he was very effective in selling himself as a man of the people on this edition of Raw. Of course there was the usual crap where he buries himself and goofily smiles when people are talking trash to him but he convincingly portrayed his unease with Hunter before his match, showed good aggression in the match itself and held his ground against CM Punk in the contract signing. MOMENT OF THE NIGHT: John Morrison's sick rope assisted dive to the outside on R-Truth.