Edge vs. Shawn Michaels

[Guest Benjie]

Edge vs. Shawn Michaels, 30/01/05

 

This would be a match that would fall under my ?match of two halves? column. The first half is pretty dull if I were to be honest. It has both its strong points and its weak points that make for it to be pretty standard, where as the last seven or so minutes are quite strong.

 

The first half?s weakness stems from communication problems as well as Edge not being able to feel the crowd. There was a spot on the outside to set up Edge doing his sit-down reverse DDT manoeuvre, but the set up was poor which resulted in the spot looking tacky, which also lead the spot looking extremely fake. Edge was also not wise in his selection of moves in the sense that it didn?t cater the crowd. The crowd were hot, so it was a time for him to capitalize on it and maybe do some heel cheating, yet he didn?t and just latched on standard holds. Holds that the crowd didn?t particularly care for, nor did anything to benefit the quality of the match. The beginning also had a plodding feel to it. This was mainly because Michaels has an annoying habit of chopping people. I wouldn?t mind if they were remotely stiff and looked like inflicting damage upon his opponent but they don?t, thus making them uninteresting. The first half did have its bright spots though. Edge did manage to use good offence in cutting Michaels off, and Edge was good at portraying himself as an unstable character.

 

The strengths in this match are undoubtedly the stretch at the end. As expected when you have Michaels in the ring, it has a few good near falls and cool counters. When Michaels starts off the whole Sweet Chin Music routine and the crowd respond, it makes for a great near fall for when the move it countered. Here is no different as Edge murdered Michaels with an Electric Chair Drop for the best near fall of the match, and one of the best this year. Edge hardly uses the move and that resulted in there being false hope that he had won. The WWE need to encourage its wrestlers in using more than the basic offence, as it makes matches much better. Edge was also able to pull out a Reverse Sharpshooter (Have no idea what to call it), which also made for some great drama as yet again; he doesn?t use the move on a consistent basis. I didn?t like the fact that Michaels was able to kick out of two spears from Edge though, but he did at least manage to put them over as strong moves as he was still selling them after they had happened to him.

 

As a whole the match was a solid affair, but nothing above *** or worth branching out for. Hunter was able to take Orton to something better. Hunter vs. Orton on the same night just had a rather tedious ending which sucked a lot of the goodness that the match had for it.