4 WWE Women’s Wrestling Takeaways: Toni Storm Prevails
By JB Alexander
Credit: WWE.com
SmackDown Tries, Sort Of Succeeds with Asuka
Asuka’s reign as the SmackDown Women’s Champion has been so cold that WWE has even begun calling it out on television.
Becky Lynch opened SmackDown by saying when she was the champion the title was the talk of the wrestling world, but now that Asuka’s the champion, we never even see her. And she’s right; WWE has made little to no use of Asuka most weeks since TLC when she won the championship.
SmackDown aimed to rectify this to a degree by featuring her heavily in the opening segments. The champion soon interrupted Becky and the two got involved in a tense verbal confrontation that very nearly led to a throwdown.
The IIconics joined the fray to state their intentions of becoming the inaugural Women’s Tag Team Champions and winning the Royal Rumble to go on to WrestleMania, but they found themselves unwilling participants in two separate one-on-one matches that saw Becky defeat Peyton Royce and Asuka beat Billie Kay.
This is all nice, of course. It was good to see the SmackDown Women’s Champion featured on the show for a change, and it’s about freaking time Billie Kay and Peyton Royce got some much deserved screen time.
Unfortunately, what SmackDown attempted to do sort of felt forced and ultimately fell short of generating any real storyline momentum for the title match at the Royal Rumble. Asuka versus Becky Lynch will undoubtedly be a great contest, but it might be too late to get anything meaningful out of what happens before and after.
Next. Taking Note Of An Awesome Aspect Of Bayley’s Character. dark
It should come as no surprise that NXT UK TakeOver: Blackpool gave us the best women’s wrestling match of the week. Rhea Ripley and Toni Storm have great chemistry and they had a lot to prove as they build a fresh new women’s division, but Raw and SmackDown didn’t phone things in like they’ve done in recent weeks.
With a battle on the horizon between both Four Horsewomen factions and the big news regarding the crowning of the first Women’s Tag Team Champions, all in all in was a pretty eventful week.