Another episode of the GWF’s Who’s Next sees another return from season one as the contest continues!
Opening with our recap from last week, we find out that Cris Opus won the fan vote… fix! This week, your judges are Tarkan Aslan, John Klinger and Matt Cross… and we’ve got another returning competitor!
First to the ring is Matze, who points at the “We Are GWF” sign on his way down. His pre-tape tells us he’s been training for four years and has had ten matches… I forget how many that’s up by since his appearance last season against his brother Martin Guerrero (we’ll slowly be posting the season one reviews, don’t worry!) He’s still rocking the Dragonball Z gimmick, doing a low-effort fireball on his way to the ring. Ehh, hadouken!
Matze reckons he’s back because he’s here to prove that with every loss, you get stronger. His opponent is Nico Block, who’s been going for five years and has had 53 matches. Better. He’s looking to be the first world class wrestler from the German Democratic Republic – the old Eastern Germany, to you and me.
Matze vs. Nico Block
We start with an “awful” side headlock from Matze (per Tarkan Aslan), as the judges talk about Dragonball Z to cover for the match.
Matze throws some clubbing forearms as he took Block into the corner, as Aslan says that he, Da Mack and WALTER trained him. Block takes over with a shoulder charge, then an armdrag, as Matze was sent into the ropes… but his positioning is all off. He’s able to recover with an overhead kick that surprised the judges, who were having trouble positively identifying the good guy and bad guy here. Perhaps it’s to do with the bad guy (Block) appealing to the crowd?
Matze hits a suplex, then rolls backwards into a guillotine, before taking Nico into the corner for some chops. Must have been Mack. We get the Miz’s through-the-corner clothesline for a near-fall from Matze, before he wrenches at the “GDR guy” with a cravat. Block fights out, but gets pulled into a headlock that he has to elbow free from, before he walked into a rather nonchalant boot for a near-fall.
Aslan keeps taking shots at Matze, who gets dumped on his head when a tiltawhirl DDT slipped a little… Matze looks dazed, as he starts trading elbow shots, before working up into a… what the hell was that? Powerbomb that slipped into a Samoan drop. Or the Messed Up! Block goes for what looked to be the Kotaro Krusher, but it just faceplants Matze as Nico goes up top. Meanwhile, the GWF subtitler is completely at a loss for what’s been said by Matt Cross, stopping as Nico salutes for a senton bomb… and gets it for the win!
A little sloppy, but far from the worst match they’ve had here… except they went more than a minute over time.
The post-match judging saw Matze’s promo get criticised for lack of intensity, while Block’s had little content. There’s more technical criticisms with Klinger critiquing positioning and timing, while Tarkan brings up the elephant in the room that was the face/heel alignments. Matt Cross brought up the general lack of pinning attempts, but on the whole was a decent, if not rough, performance.
Next week: two guys who apparently don’t look like athletes and have iffy gear. Sounds like a doozy!