“Not everyone is this kind of fan but I think it would help a lot of people on here if they picked a wrestling match they loved and wrote about it in detail. Really study it. What each moment in the match is telling you, how the wrestlers convey info/emotion to you, etc”
I’ll admit, watching wrestling and doing live reviews, it’s easy for a lot of it to just wash over you in the moment. Live it, but then take a while for it to register just what it meant. For Snowboiiii’s exercise, I’m going to pick a match that came very early on in my “going to Germany fandom” and a match that some shortened down to the moment that came before it.
Not everyone is this kind of fan but I think it would help a lot of people on here if they picked a wrestling match they loved and wrote about it in detail. Really study it. What each moment in the match is telling you, how the wrestlers convey info/emotion to you, etc
— snowboiiii (@snowboiiii) October 28, 2026
While this is a match that stands on its own two feet, there’s a lot more to take from the story that went into it. Having won 16 Carat Gold in 2017, Ilja Dragunov was on a collision course for the wXw Unified World Wrestling Championship, at the time held by “Bad Bones” John Klinger. A man that Ilja had history with going back several years over the Shotgun title – a title that Ilja was the first holder of in 2013, only to have to vacate it due to injury at the start of 2014.
Regaining the belt in 2015, beating Klinger in a Wladiwostok Rules match over 16 Carat Gold weekend, Dragunov would largely move away from Klinger for a while as Bones would move up the card… until Dragunov won Carat in 2017, defeating Klinger en-route to overcoming WALTER in the finals. Later that summer, Dragunov would get his crack at the title, only to be usurped by Klinger again as Bones’ newly-formed RISE group were running roughshod over wXw.
Another shot for Ilja, during wXw’s World Tag Team League weekender, ended with more RISE shenanigans, when Da Mack ran out to stop Klinger hitting a belt shot… and land it on Bones himself. Only to openly admit what he’d done to referee Tassilo Jung, whose loud exclamation of “FUCK!” mirrored the crowd’s own feelings as the match ended in an obvious disqualification, ahead of an ensuing melee that quickly revealed that Da Mack was in on it all along, becoming a part of RISE in the process.
One more shot for Ilja was set at December’s anniversary show, with a three-part documentary appearing on wXw’s weekly Shotgun series to provide some more colour to Ilja’s character – delving into parts of his background that had previously been unsaid, such as his upbringing as the son of an immigrant (“eating shit was an everyday occurance”), while also covering a mental breakdown while recovering from a head injury. By the end of the three-parter, it switched more into character stuff, with the interviewer warning Ilja that if he won the title in wXw, he’d have to give so much more… and that his big match at the anniversary show could spell the end of him, almost like it was one final hurrah. At the time it was intriguing, and something that was later repeated to some degree when Ilja was in NXT.
Ilja would leave the anniversary show, bloodied and beaten… and with Bad Bones departing as champion, the cameras lingered on Dragunov as he said his farewell, with the show ending with the simple words, “Thank You Ilja.” Not a thing was said beyond that, as everyone went around their merry business, going up to 16 Carat Gold, where the big title match of the weekend was to see Klinger defend the title against WALTER.
Klinger wanted the match to be a street fight, something WALTER was dead set against… so instead, WALTER was allowed to pick the stipulation. Which wouldn’t be announced until showtime. Boy, that’s a lot of words just to set up the road to March 10, 2018 at the Turbinenhalle.
Thank you Google Translate: “John, you were always one step ahead of us. But since the 17th Anniversary, that’s no longer the case. I owe someone a favour. This match is a three-way dance.”
Cue the Soviet March. Cue delirium. Ilja Dragunov was back in wXw. Live, this was an experience… on tape, it was even better. From the shot of John Klinger cowering with a quivering lip in the corner, shook by the turn of events as over a thousand fans were losing their mind.
And then, the match. Even when the sound returns from the royalty-free overdub, you can still hear the crowd on a high, not least because they sensed a title change. Early interference saw Lucky Kid, Tarkan Aslan, Pete Bouncer, Ivan Kiev and Da Mack hit the ring and get dispatched, almost as a nod to those expecting the finish to be influenced by RISE, and a way to check that proverbial box. This wasn’t to be one of those matches, and when John Klinger’s attempt to escape with the title ended with him quickly begging off… we’d checked off the tropes nice and early.
With that out of the way, we indulged in what was effectively a handicap match, with the good guys giving Klinger some comeuppance… before WALTER booted the face off of Dragunov, if only to show that his favour ended at bringing him back, and he wasn’t about to hand Ilja a quick win.
A diversion of those two trading chops was interrupted by Klinger, whose return to the fray lowered the volume a little as he threatened to take over from the others’ work. Unlike most other triple-threats, this didn’t immediately devolve into “someone has a rest” as Dragunov bounced Bones around before it was back to the pairing the crowd really wanted to see as the bruising blows continued.
An enziguiri from Dragunov that looked like it went flush the ear of Bones stopped another threat, and gave the camera a chance to show Ilja’s marked-up chest before we had a swap around, with WALTER returning to stop Bones away as he went for a dive – and again have the crowd believing that Bad Bones could be done here. A trip to wXw’s one seating area gave us our allotted dives while the standing-room-only crowd craned their necks to see Ilja getting tossed through chairs. Literally.
Another scare from Bones was almost shrugged off by a crowd that was really starting to not believe in any shot Bones had of retaining, to the point that they were cheering on anything and everything that was being done to Klinger. An experience that really unified the Turbinenhalle, even including those that were wearing RISE merch.
Of course, it wasn’t long before we went back to the greatest hits of late ‘10s wrestling – the chops. As long as they land and sound good, they’re always a winner. Doubly so if one of the recipients had something to show for the firework-y nature of the strikes, which for Ilja just added even more to his character’s established “fighting for my family with everything I’ve got” maxim.
Another interruption from Klinger this time saw him capitalise on weakened opponents. Ilja’s Torpedo Moscau somehow wiped out WALTER… but left him with enough to break up a pin from a Shadow Driver as Klinger started digging into his bag of tricks. Wrecking Ball Knees? Sure, but here’s a shotgun dropkick and a Coast to Coast in return.
With Klinger out of the picture again, WALTER and Dragunov picked up their story, with the strikes finally looking to wear Ilja out as his desperate Torpedo Moscau was caught and turned into a sleeper. Escaping, Dragunov hits the move again before wiping out Bones as the champion looked for a belt shot. That doesn’t get it done, so Ilja has to dig a little deeper, hauling up Bones for a move Alan Counihan fantastically dubbed on commentary the BURNING HAMMER AND CICLE… before one more Torpedo Moscau got the job done. Cue the return of the delirium, as a crowd that barely half an hour ago knew that Ilja Dragunov was back resumed their highs of earlier. I say “barely knew” – except for Chris Brookes, who stumbled into the surprise and kept tight-lipped!)
A great match that was made all the greater not only from the live bias, but from the sheer energy of the crowd. A 20-minute match that some could reduce to WALTER and Ilja throwing chops and beating the piss out of each other, but for those who’d followed along with the Dragunov story going in, this match was the culmination of a year-long arc. From winning Carat 12 months prior, to coming up short for the title, through to the sudden and unexpected departure. For everyone crammed into the Turbinenhalle that night, the payoff felt earned. masterclass in long-term storytelling, physicality, and catharsis.
The rice pudding was all the sweeter on that night.