WWE 205 Live Review - March 7, 2017

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

WWE Cruiserweight Champion Neville Interrupted Austin Aries

Aries is far and away the greatest talker in the Cruiserweight division, so this was a strong promo from him explaining his actions from Raw on Monday night. Neville was excellent in his rebuttal as well and this program is already off to a solid start. I'm happy that this will likely be a one-on-one match at WrestleMania as opposed to the Cruiserweight Open I feared we would get, which still could happen on the Kickoff show just not over the title.

Rich Swann and Jack Gallagher def. Noam Dar and Ariya Daivari

Swann and Dar apparently have their thing going, but it honestly doesn't interest me in the slightest. Daivari is simply floundering at this point and I was hoping we would hear more from Gallagher regarding his loss to Neville at Fastlane, because the follow-up was disappointing. Don't get me wrong, this was a fun little match, but it largely meant nothing and fans will continue to not care as long as that's the case.

Akira Tozawa def. Bryan Kendrick

No, that's not a typo: Tozawa actually faced someone named Bryan Kendrick, or at least that was the individual's name according to The Brian Kendrick. I was fine with the bait-and-switch because they never once advertised the match as happening, and it delays their eventual match until another day. This was kept short and sweet and the crowd was into Tozawa's entertaining offense, but I'm waiting to see Tozawa in a more competitive match.

Austin Aries def. Tony Nese

I would have held off until next week for Aries to return to the ring, but it was cool nevertheless to have him back wrestling. And he hasn't seemingly lost a step. Nese is one of the division's resident jobbers on the heel side, yet he can always be counted on for a quality contest. He and Aries worked well against each other, but this should have been more-sided to establish Aries as a contender to the championship off the bat. At any rate, I look forward to the matches Aries will have with the rest of the division heading into WrestleMania.

Overall Show

As much of a riot as Aries was on commentary (and he will dearly missed in that role), he was the star this show desperately needed, along with Neville. He made this episode interesting all on his own. The tag team match was decent albeit forgettable, but at least Tozawa and Kendrick were able to further their feud. I'm excited to see more of Aries and Neville on 205 Live in the weeks ahead.