We have one last match to look back on from this year’s 16 Carat Gold tournament – the alternate four-way that ended up not being needed.
As with most years, wXw held a four-way match on the pre-show to have a named alternate ready “just in case”. This match was tucked away on their pre-show, which, since it’s in German, will have us making ample use of the fast-forward button…
Absolute Andy vs. Bobby Gunns vs. Michael Dante vs. Francis Kaspin
Since wXw dub over the entrances, it’s fun seeing the pre-show panel dancing and clapping on the stage to totally different music…
At the start, Bobby Gunns realises he’s outnumbered, but its Francis Kaspin who leaps into him first as everyone takes their turn launching into the “King of Smoke Style”. Andy and Dante lay into him with forearms in the corner, before the two big lads turn their sights on each other, until Kaspin returned with a double springboard dropkick.
In the middle of that, Gunns had taken a spill to the outside, but he returned to take some armdrags as Dante was dropkicked to the outside. A top rope elbow drop gets a two-count as Andy broke up the cover, before he went back to battle with Dante and his loud Dutch forearms. Gunns unwisely interjects himself here, then offers a handshake… instead getting chopped to pieces by Andy.
Andy connects with a legdrop, before Dante’s thrown to the outside as he too looked to land on Gunns, who took the Absolute Kneedrop for his troubles. A second Absolute Kneedrop follows, but an Andy superkick is prevented by a big crossbody from Kaspin, who then has to deal with Gunns in the corner.
A clothesline from Andy drops Kaspin to the outside as the two big lads go back to each other, with a hanging suplex from Andy looking to get him the spot as an alternate. Gunns low bridges him to the floor as he watched Dante shoulder tackle Kaspin out of the sky. The finals tretch saw Kaspin take an F5 from Andy , before Gunns countered one into a cross armbreaker, but Andy powered up into another F5!
Gunns kicked out just in time, before a spear from Dante took Andy out of the equation, leaving just Gunns and Kaspin. Francis went for another elbow off the top, but he missed and landed into another cross armbreaker as Bobby Gunns became the official alternate for 16 Carat Gold. A pretty decent match, but at eight minutes long it was way too short – considering that the same time was given to a lot of the initial first round matches later in the night! **¾
So, that brings an end to our coverage of 16 Carat Gold weekend. Thirty-eight matches over four days of shows… (not including the unaired dark matches). That was quite a marathon!
wXw returns with their next big card, True Colours, in April, as they build up to May’s Superstars of Wrestling supercard.