Sabaton Worcester Concert reviews
Good house show, but with technical issues
Opener: Ridge Holland with Sheamus vs. Rick Boogs (w)
Ricochet (c) (w) vs. Sami Zayn - Intercontinental Championship Match
Viking Warriors (w) vs. Los Lotharios
Shinsuke Nakamura with Boogs vs. Happy Corbin (w)
Aliyah, Naomi, and Sasha Banks (w) vs. Natalya, Baszler, and Sonya DeVille
Drew McIntyre and New Day vs. Roman Reigns and the Usos (w) - Main Event
Aliyah (w) vs. Shayna Baszler with Natalya (DQ)
Aliyah and Naomi (w) vs. Baszler and Natalya (DQ)
I had never seen a WWE event, and I was surprised by how fast-paced it was, having only an intermission between the IC match and the VW-Lotharios match. Everything followed one after the other, with the exception of a guitar solo by Boogs before his match, and a promo by Sami Zayn before his. All of them were entertaining, though there definitely was more of a lull for the women's match, which seemed like it was just a means of stuffing as many women in one match as possible, and the first official tag match, which is the only one that didn't really have any main eventers. Shinsuke Nakamura's match also suffered when Boogs's guitar had technical issues, which made one of Nakamura's moves lose its oomph when it was supposed to have been accentuated by Boogs's riffs. Boogs went to the back to correct the issue, but by then, the spot was ruined.
Nevertheless, the opener, IC, and main event matches went very well. Boogs got everyone invested in his match and was probably the most engaging match outside of the main event. Sami Zayn was just as successful as Boogs in the opposite direction: there were more jeers for Zayn than cheers for Ricochet--probably because Ricochet didn't pull his best stunts out for a non-televised event.
And of course, the main event almost could not fail, putting WWE's biggest active hero aside from Lesnar with their biggest heroic tag team against the Bloodline. However, the Bloodline also happens to be from Pensacola, so even though they were against the biggest babyfaces in WWE, the Bloodline were the heroes for this match, being cheered no matter what they did. While Drew McIntyre stayed pure babyface, the New Day played into it, behaving more heelish than usual for them. (Xavier Woods also made an appearance, which was surprising, since he hadn't yet reappeared on television yet. I assume it was because Big E was unexpectedly injured the Friday before on SmackDown. Woods notably had no aspects of his King of the Ring win--no crown, no special entrance.) After winning, Roman gave a short, apparently unscripted promo thanking Pensacola and the fans there and just praising his hometown in general.
Aside from the issues with Sabaton's guitar and the lackluster women's match, this was a very enjoyable house show.