One week out from Unstoppable, Rampage put his Defiant title on the line as Gabriel KIdd got his reward for extortion.
After opening up with the recap of “last time” of Joe Hendry saving Primate from Rory Coyle and Gabriel Kidd… Nathan Cruz Pillman-izing the neck of Dereiss… and Benji upsetting Martin Kirby! Oh, and Gabriel Kidd extorting a title match out of Simon Miller. We’re still in Newcastle with Dave Bradshaw and James R. Kennedy on commentary.
Defiant Women’s Championship: Lana Austin vs. Kanji (c)
We’ve a jump start as Austin attacked Kanji before the bell, taking her into the corner before coming in with a headbutt for an early two-count.
Kanji’s back with a trip and an elbow drop as she took Austin into the ropes, ahead of a springboard chop that had Austin on the back foot. A missed 619 has Kanji briefly on the defensive, as a missile dropkick turned things back around. Austin rolls outside and grabs some chairs from under the ring, sliding one in to distract the referee before a second one was used to attack Kanji with. Referee Steve Lynskey’s suspicious over what happened, and so Austin just cracks him in the back with the chair. Well, he can’t DQ her if he didn’t see her throw it, right? Kanji comes back with a superkick, only to miss a moonsault as Kanji eats a DDT for a long visual pin. Shouldn’t have wiped out the ref, eh?
Referee number two comes in, but Kanji kicks out and almost won with a flash roll-up. Austin keeps up with a draping DDT through the ropes, but Steve Lynskey gets up and throws the match out for the earlier chairshot. For once James Kennedy has a point – the referee was blindsided with the chairshot, so how could he DQ anyone?? **
We get a recap of Lana Austin turning on Millie McKenzie last year and everything that followed towards this weekend’s Austin/Priestley falls count anywhere match.
Backstage, Lucky Kid is accosted by the Anti-Fun Police and General Ameen. They’re accusing him of stealing El Phantasmo’s sunglasses, so Deputy Drake arrests him. No Fun Dunne asks if he gets his Anti-Hardcore match with Jimmy Havoc, where if Havoc uses a weapon, he loses his Hardcore title. Just the thought of that is ridiculous for Lucky, who appears to have been stitched up here.
Micky Mann vs. John Klinger
We’ve got some overdubbing as Dave Bradshaw has to undo the segment from a few weeks back where we were going to get Bad Bones vs. Ilja Dragunov… and instead we’re getting Bones vs. Justin Sysum.
We start with a lock-up as Bones, still in his beanie, chops Mickey into the corner before he rudely shoved Mann to the ropes and to the outside, ahead of a Macho Man-ish axehandle drop. Bad Bones is really just doing Randy Savage stuff in 2019, isn’t he? Back inside, a slingshot spear puts Mann down ahead of a top rope elbow. We like a squash, ooh yeah. Dig it?
There’s a trailer for Lights Out, the next-but-one Defiant special, which will feature PAC. It’s from Leeds’ O2 Academy on April 17 – yes, a Wednesday night. Speaking of PAC… he heads to the ring for promo time. It’s not quite the heroes welcome from a few weeks back, but he says he’s back here for competition… and he’s disappointed because he perceives that the Defiant roster is “very slim pickings”. So he issues an open challenge, complete with some Extremely Local References to pop the crowd, before tossing the mic away. He’ll be back on future episodes of Loaded, hopefully against “real competition”.
Mark Haskins is backstage trying to cut a promo, but he’s distracted by Omari and Nathan Cruz brawling. Those two face off at Unstoppable, as Simon Miller was handily on the scene to make the booking.
South Coast Connection (Ashley Dunn & Kelly Sixx) vs. Dynamic Duo (Mark Billington & Thomas Billington)
This one stemmed from the Billington’s exhibition getting interrupted a few weeks ago… they’ve got the jobber entrance video sadly…
Sixx and Mark start us off, with wristlocks being traded and flipped out of as Sixx cowered into the corner for… reasons. Marty Jone’s sitting at ringside with the house mic, and he’s giving his reactions, including laughing at Sixx for “falling on his fat arse”. The Indy Corner podcast compared him to Jack Duckworth out of Coronation Street back in the day, and now I cannot unsee that entire comparison.
The second try around has Mark dropkicked away by Sixx, whose attempt at the Ospreay handspring feint was… not exactly graceful! It gave Mark a chance to get back in as the Billingtons score with a crossbody and a dropkick, with before a double-team suplex took Sixx out of the corner. Sixx rakes the eyes and draps Mark across the ropes before he booted him to the outside, where Ashley Dunn takes some cheapshots before he tagged himself in.
A suplex from Dunn looked to set up for Sixx’ Jig ‘n’ Tonic, but Mark rolls free and tags in Thomas, who fires in with clotheslines and a Dynamite Kid-esque snap suplex. Sixx low bridges Thomas to the outside, prompting Marty Jones out of his chair to help… and yes, he takes a bump as a baseball slide dropkick wiped out Marty… who rolls into the ring to get him some. Problem is, it distracted the referee from a roll-up as the Billingtons would have won, before Sixx ended up winning with a roll-up. Ah, this wasn’t too great, but the Billingtons are at least competent – give them time, and they’ll come good. **
There’s a backstage promo with not-Jon Briley and Benji, who’s still shocked at beating Martin Kirby. Benji challenges the winner of the Kirby/El Phantasmo match to a shot at the Internet title “next time”.
General Ameen’s interrogating Lucky Kid, who tells us he’s deaf in his right ear. That’s good to know! Lucky hasn’t seen ELP’s glasses… but he has seen his Twitter, and that just annoys Ameen. Messing around doesn’t help his case, as Lucky’s more interested in his phone. This feels like it’s right out of the GWF’s Three Count, and that’s not a backhanded compliment. Lucky Kid speaks to his shoe like it’s a phone, and just walks out… that was, bizarre.
They run through the card for Unstoppable:
John Klinger vs. Justin Sysum
Nathan Cruz vs. Omari
Falls Count Anywhere: Lana Austin vs. Bea Priestley
Anti-Hardcore Match for Defiant Hardcore Championship: No Fun Dunne vs. Jimmy Havoc (c)
Defiant Tag Team Championship: Chris Brookes & Lucky Kid vs. Aussie Open (Mark Davis & Kyle Fletcher) (c)
Defiant Internet Championship: El Phantasmo vs. Martin Kirby (c)
Defiant World Championship: David Starr vs. Rampage (c)
There’s also a Rory Coyle & Gabriel Kidd vs. Primate & Joe Hendry match that wasn’t included in that round-up – Lucky Kidd was added as Chris Brookes’ partner on Monday night, in a YouTube video posted by Defiant.
Defiant World Championship: Gabriel Kidd vs. Rampage (c)
Gabriel Kidd’s gotten new music, having ditched whatever that tripe was he had at the start of WCPW, and lately replacing Paper Shop Dave’s “Dumb” with… silence.
Living up to his new moniker of the Young Bull, Kidd charges at Rampage with shoulder tackles early, before he was caught with a powerslam off the ropes as Rampage quickly found his groove. Chops and suplexes left Kidd down for a two-count, before he’s clotheslined to the outside.
Rampage follows with more gunshot-like chops, but Kidd does his best to keep his distance before he trapped Rampage under the ring apron, throwing knees as the champion was unsighted. Back inside, Kidd throws forearms, only for Rampage to invite more of them as the champion seemed to be in his element here. A knee to the gut stops Rampage, as Kidd again clubs away on him ahead of a Samoan drop that turned the match on its head. Rampage can’t quite get a piledriver off, so he trades more shots with Kidd, who comes back with a shoulder tackle that charged Rampage back to the mat… at least until Rampage hit back with a clothesline for a two-count.
We’re back to strikes as Rampage and Kidd try to find a way through, before an uppercut from Kidd almost led to a backslide, except he rolled through and landed a sit-out powerbomb for a near-fall. Another Kidd lariat’s good for a two-count, before a piledriver… is just no-sold by Rampage, who found enough in him to hit a spinebuster before collapsing to the mat. Rampage puts the boots to Kidd, then lifts him to the top rope for an avalanche piledriver… but Kidd fights free with headbutts, before Rampage repositioned himself for a powerslam off the top rope. One piledriver later, and Rampage retains… so, where was Rory Coyle during all of this? He was happy to help Kidd get a shot, but not even appear at ringside?! This was a good match that showed how far Kidd’s come in the past year, but he’s just a little shy of title contention right now. There’s an example of how time and nurturing talent helps a guy. ***
David Starr appears on the stage to close the show, as we finish with an obligatory shoving match between the champion and challenger for Unstoppable, which of course broke down into a brawl. Prince Ameen, Micky Mann, Omari and referees separate them, as we close with Starr holding the title aloft in the ring.
As a go-home show, this episode of Loaded ticked the boxes as pretty much every storyline going into Unstoppable was covered – either with in-ring segments or comprehensive recap packages. While Defiant are still looking at recapturing their buzz, they’re still putting on some solid shows, with perfectly-fine TV shows that do what wrestling TV used to do – help convince you to spend money on the bigger shows!
- Watch Loaded #9 on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=le25r0wMnvM