[2001-01-01-WWF-Raw] Steve Austin vs William Regal

[GSR]

Stephanie McMahon is the guest referee which automatically doesn’t bode well for ‘Stone Cold’.  ‘The King’ points out how it’s hypocritical for JR to think it’s great when Mick Foley would pull a trick like this, but not so when Stephanie does it.  He’s got a point.  Austin with a Thesz press and he then unloads with rapid piston like right hands into Regal’s face.    He repeatedly slams his head into the turnbuckles before choking him around the throat, using every bit of those five seconds and paying no attention to Stephanie’s instructions.  ‘Stone Cold’ continues to ignore and disobey her, firstly following Regal to the floor after she had told him to stay inside and then when she tells him to “keep it in the ring” immediately takes it back outside.  Oh yeah, not forgetting to give her the bird which draws plenty of laughter from the fans.  They finally do return to the ring and Austin covers Regal after three vertical suplexes only for Stephanie to stop her slow count at two making out as though she’s got something in her eye.  As she turns her back on him to rub it, he gives her a shove on the backside and she tumbles out through the ropes.  Earl Hebner runs down to take her place as Austin and Regal go toe to toe exchanging blows.  He checks on Stephanie and as he does so, Regal with a low blow to Austin before clubbing Earl in the back of the head and KO’ing him.  His Lordship pulls Stephanie back into the ring, but runs into an Austin spinebuster.  ‘Stone Cold’ makes the cover, however Stephanie is in the corner seemingly still not recovered from earlier.  Austin goes over to her and grabs her by the hair when Regal schoolboys him and Stephanie fast counts his shoulders to the mat.  She high tails it back up the ramp way in front of the Titantron where she erroneously announces the winner as “Steven Regal”, as JR goes off on how Austin warned her and she has no idea what she has done.  Fun stuff here.

[soup23]

Austin barges in and asks Stephanie about his title shot.  Steph puts him up for a job he might enjoy.  That is being a beer vendor.  Austin is taking Kevin’s job.  Steph smugly walks out and then Kevin has something to say so Austin beats him up.

 

Austin has his vendor tray over him when Steph walks up and is still smug. Austin accidently sprays mustard on her and she stomps off into her locker room.

 

Back from break, Austin is tasting and drinking all of the beers.  JR says he is a very conscience vendor.

 

Steph is venting to Vince on the phone and how her silk blouse is ruined.  Trish comes in and she asks Vince about the holidays. Vince says they were fantastic.  We learn that Test will face Benoit for the IC title.  Steph goes on a big rant against Trish and kicks her out of the office.

Austin stomps to the ring and asks for Steph to come out.  He shows that he has sold all the beer and hotdogs.  Steph comes out in her new blouse and asks who the hell he is talking to and Austin says a bitch.  The crowd then starts up the slut chant which Austin lets Steph know about.  We see that APA bought all of Austin’s beer.  Regal vs Austin gets set up and we learn that it will be  triple threat match now on SmackDown. Austin puts the vendor tray over steph and when he tries to pull it off, it gets caught on the shirt and tears it off.  Steph runs away embarrassed.

 

Regal leaves Stephs dressing room with a big smile on his face. It is time for the main event. We learn from Regal that Steph is the guest referee.  Another pretty fun brawl based match.  Austin dominates for the most part sending Regal into the table.  It looks like Austin has the match in hand but Steph gets something in her eye and can’t count to three. That leads to a really good brawl segment in the corner with both Regal and Austin dropping some stiff shots. Regal lands a low blow and then wipes out Hebner who came out to referee too. Spinebuster from Austin and he goes for the count but Steph is still out.  Austin grabs Steph by the hair but gets rolled up by Regal. A quick count later gives Regal the win. Steph announces Regal as the winner as Austin looks on in complete disgust. She announces the winner again as Steven Regal and the loser as Steve Austin. Austin gives Regal a stunner to take out his frustration. Overall, a pretty fun Raw for a holiday version. **3/4

[AstroBoy]

Not much to this as the ref start largely overshadows it.  Regal gets a few snug flurries and looks aggressive but Austin mostly beats on him from the outset.  But they keep it brisk and move it along nicely.  Regal gets the cheap fast count rollup to steal one.