WWE NXT UK Review - June 10, 2021

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

NXT UK Champion WALTER Addressed His Historic Title Reign

WALTER was all over NXT and NXT UK TV at one point earlier this year, but following his successful title defense at NXT TakeOver: Stand & Deliver and then at NXT UK Prelude, he hasn't been seen since. I don't think he's even been mentioned in the last two months, which is bizarre. He spoke for a few minutes here about his dominant reign and how he plans to be champion forever. That was it. Usually, someone would come out and interrupt and kick off his next program, but that wasn't the case. In other words, it was a fairly pointless promo. Will WALTER simply move on to NXT full-time without actually losing the title and vacate it instead?

Jordan Devlin def. Saxon Huxley

Devlin is another one who hasn't been around at all for the last two months. That makes a bit more sense coming off his lengthy reign as NXT Cruiserweight Champion, but I have no idea what he does going forward considering he's faced pretty much everyone in NXT UK over the last three years. I'd rather see him make the move over to NXT and rekindle his rivalry with Kushida considering he was never pinned for the title. This was a weird match between two heels that was oddly dominated by Huxley. I know Huxley is a lot bigger than Devlin size-wise, but he's also boring and not very good, so I was hoping this would be quicker and more one-sided in favor of Devlin.

Symbiosis (Primate and Tyson T-Bone) def. Dan Moloney and Andy Wild

Despite the new name and makeover, Symbiosis feel a little cold right now coming off their back-to-back losses to the Gallus guys, not to mention that was a month or two ago. Now it looks like they're gunning for the tag titles because Pretty Deadly need another team to beat. Speaking of Pretty Deadly, their commentary was the most interesting part about this, which was otherwise a squash. Symbiosis is fine, but am I the only one who liked them better as The Hunt? Needless to say, I wouldn't put the tag titles on them right now, at least not without building them up a bit more first.

Meiko Satomura def. Kay Lee Ray to Win the NXT UK Women's Championship

The last match these two had a few months ago was an instant classic and this was equally excellent. Ray doesn't often get the credit she deserves for being as one of the best women WWE has, while Satomura is still terrific at this stage of her career. They once again worked wonderfully together, told a great story, and had some strong nearfalls. Ray had been champion for almost two years, so it was high time someone took the title from her and Satomura made as much sense as anyone. My only nitpick is that there wasn't a crowd to react to this in person. I wish they waited, but who knows when NXT UK will be able to run shows again with the way things are COVID-wise over there at the moment.

Overall Show

Considering Ray was champion for so long, it was necessary for the title changing hands to feel like a big deal and it definitely did. Thus, I can't recommend Ray vs. Satomura enough, along with the fact that the match was just exceptional. The rest of the show was solid but paled in comparison to the main event. I was excited for the returns of WALTER and Devlin, but their appearances were uneventful. On the bright side, the hype for the two matches happening next week was well done.

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