[2020-10-04-WWE-NXT TakeOver: 31] Finn Balor vs Kyle O'Reilly

[ShittyLittleBoots]

The video package for this match was goddamn fantastic. Between it & the one for Reigns/Uso, WWE has been knocking it out of the park with 'em lately. I've been a pretty big Kyle O'Reilly fan since 2013, so seeing him in a big main event spot like this warms my heart. The match itself was really, really good. I thought Finn & Kyle brought a very nice amount of grit & struggle into the bout, which is something the NXT main events haven't seen in a while. Some very solid technical wrasslin' in the beginning stages, and once Bálor delivers that big spinning kick to Kyle's mid-section, the big story kicks in. Kyle sells the ribs really well throughout I thought, especially in those big knockdown moments, and Bálor was pretty damn good with his work over those said ribs. There were a few moments where he was busting out some real lame looking stomps, but then he totally made up for them a few moments later with a big irish whip chest-first into the corner or a big boot to the mid-section. All in all, it was probably some of the most compelling work he's done on the offense in his WWE run thus far. Kyle finding an opening with that low dropkick to the knee was awesome, and him continuing that attack to counter Bálor's ruthless destruction of his mid-section ruled -- there was quite a few great singular moments in the match, and one of them that stood out for me was when Kyle grabbed that leg, he was desperately looking to go for _something_, Bálor counters it into an abdominal stretch & we briefly get an awesome image of Kyle in big trouble, bloody mouth and all. Now Kyle got out of the hold very quickly, but I thought the whole little sequence there ruled. Great sense of struggle, despair & tenacity. The "big" leg-drama towards the end with the dragon screws on the ropes, and the leglock stuff was solid, even though I do think that the leglock-part of it fell a bit flat -- funny enough, I've always thought that Kyle's leglocks look a bit weak, and such was the case here. The rest of that stretch was pretty great though, and the actual finish w/ the Coup De Grace was awesome, and made all the more sweet because Bálor finished him off by delivering the deathblow to the bodypart he had been targeting for most of the match. REALLY GOOD SHIT ALL AROUND. Did I want it to be even better given the hype? Yes, but I am also satisfied with what we got, because it was indeed awesome. ***3/4

[Clayton Jones]

I don't remember reading a single negative review for this match and it still surprised me with how good it was. Cohesive, urgent, mostly fueled by a fantastic babyface performance from O'Reilly but with juuust enough from Balor to say it's more than a carry job. My favorite things O'Reilly did in this match were the scrambles to the ropes, the dashes to close space and slap on a submission, stuff that demanded your attention. Top it off with an astonishingly succinct and fitting finish and this was certainly among the better matches I've seen from last year.