NXT NOVEMBER 1ST 2017
McIntyre versus Almas was made official for Takeover and a contract signing was announced.
Taynara Conti vs. Nikki Cross
This all came out of Conti costing Cross a match a few weeks ago for Undisputed Era, as well as their interaction in the battle royal last week. The vacant NXT Womens Title was set up on the stage and Cross spent a long time looking at it during her entrance. Cross started aggressively and although Conti was able to fight back, it didn’t really phase Cross much, winning pretty decisively in the end with a swinging fisherman’s neckbreaker.
An interview from after last week’s show with Mercedes Martinez was shown. She said she was disappointed not to win the battle royal, as she’d been winning big matches all over the world. She then claimed Ember wouldn’t win at Takeover, as she’d proven she couldn’t win the big matches.
Johnny Gargano vs. Fabian Aichner
Very fun match. After an even start, Aichner briefly got the advantage going into the break, with Gargano getting back into it soon there-after. Gargano avoided Aichner’s double jump moonsault and got a two off of a slingshot DDT. Aichner got a close two of his own with a big snap powerbomb, before getting the upset win in the end, catching Gargano as he went for the Gargano Escape and cradling him from an abdominal stretch position for the three count. Both guys looked good here, another solid outing for Aichner. Aichner getting the win was a surprise. Gargano can afford some losses considering his ongoing story, but they do need to make sure they don’t go to the well too often.
Drew was shown in Regal’s office signing the contract for Takeover, ahead of the official contract signing.
A video promo of sorts from Aleister Black aired, with clips from his feud with Velveteen Dream and Black saying Dream had his attention, to officially set up the Takeover match.
Footage was shown of Street Profits admiring a Maserati in the parking lot, which turned out to be Tino Sabbatelli and Riddick Moss’s car, with the two teams exchanging words and Moss and Sabbatelli warning Street Profits to stay away from it.
McIntyre came out for the second stage of the contract signing, but was jumped on the stage by Almas, who threw the belt at McIntyre while he was down and signed the contract. Almas then took some gum from Zelina and stuck the contract to Drew before he left.
Billie and Peyton cut a promo earlier in the day from the Performance Center, with Peyton annoyed that Billie wasn’t going to be in the match with her. They made fun of Sane and her pirate ways, until Sane appeared and scared Billie by threatening her with her elbow, with a match between Sane and Billie announced for next week.
NXT WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP
Sanity (c) vs. The Authors Of Pain
Young and Wolfe represented Sanity, while Ellering, who was shown backstage earlier in the show, wasn’t out with the AOP. Sanity relied on quick tags to gain the advantage, until Wolfe took a nasty looking DVD into the turnbuckles. The AOP focused on Wolfe for a while, setting up Young getting the hot tag, which the crowd were pretty into. The match picked up from that point. Sanity hit a back suplex/neckbreaker combo to Akam but Rezar made the save. The AOP then hit the Super Collider, but after hitting Young with the Last Chapter, Undisputed Era hit the ring and attacked AOP for the DQ.
Undisputed Era beat everyone down, with Killian trying to make the save before getting his shoulder posted. They set up Akam, at which point Roderick Strong came out and calmed Undisputed Era down, producing the armband they gave him last week and teasing that he was joining them. But it was a set-up, as Strong hit Cole instead and went after Fish and O’Reilly. Cole exited quickly, leaving The AOP and Strong to clear the ring of Fish and O’Reilly. Weirdly, the crowd booed Strong pretty noticeably for not joining. Regal then appeared to announce Sanity versus Undisputed Era versus Strong and The AOP in a three way War Games match. This got a big reaction, as you’d expect. Until I heard what the Takeover match was this week, I assumed Strong was joining Undisputed Era based on the past few weeks. Doing a triple threat version of War Games seems an odd choice for the first WWE version, you’d assume they would have gone as traditional as possible. Plus, Strong and The Authors Of Pain is a very weird team, set up purely by this one angle. We’ll see how it ends up though.
RECOMMENDED VIEWING: Gargano and Aichner was a really good TV match and the main event really picked up by the end of it, with the big angle and announcement to close the show. Everything else on the show was solid as well, with the twist on the ‘contract signing’ with McIntyre and Almas in particular being a good way to go.
NXT WEEK: Billie Kay versus Kairi Sane.