So... WrestleMania, I thought, was very good.. not great, but very good.

NXT TakeOver, however, was excellent.. especially the ladder match.

Here are my thoughts on Mania:

Finn Balor v The Miz v Seth Rollins - Intercontinental Championship Match: Very good opener, 3 decent competitors. The Miz does his best to portray a wimpy guy, but he's actually excellent in the ring when called upon. Rollins and Balor are both excellent, too. I'm a huge Balor fan, but I think Rollins was the rightful winner. He is now a Grand Slam winner and a worthy one. This could have easily been later on the card.

Charlotte v Asuka - SmackDown Women's Championship Match: What a great match this was. 2 incredible athletes.. sad to see Asuka's streak come to an end, but Charlotte really did deserve it. One of the best matches of the night, for me. A really nice and respectful ending, too. As with the previous match, this could have easily been later on the show.

Randy Orton v Bobby Roode v Jinder Mahal v Rusev - United States Championship Match: Personally, I'm more of a RAW guy than SmackDown and this match had a 'thrown together' feel to it. Parts were OK, but by and large, this was a filler match that could have easily slipped onto the pre-show. For me, anyway. I'm not a fan of Jinder Mahal, either, so the outcome all felt a bit 'meh' to me.

Kurt Angle & Ronda Rousey v HHH & Stephanie McMahon: What. A. Match. Rousey was sensational (and a babe). This was my match of the night. Starting with HHH & Angle slugging it out (to what my wife described as 'a couple of dads having a scrap'). They built the suspense with Steph pulling Rousey off the apron a couple of times and Kurt missing a few hot tags.. when Rousey entered the fray she exploded into life and the roof lifted off. I can't speak highly enough of this match or Rousey's performance, this was epic.

The Usos v The Bludgeon Brothers v The New Day - SmackDown Tag Team Championship Match: Again, a bit 'meh' to me. WWE are showing they are, again, leaning toward power and brutality with the outcome of this match. That's literally all I can say about it. Again, this had a feeling of 'filler', to me.

John Cena v The Undertaker - The Most Pointless Match of The Evening: This is, to me, a way of shoehorning John Cena into WrestleMania with no active or interesting storyline on-going. I'm a huge John Cena fan, but if he has no part to play in the event, don't include him, it's that simple. The fact that the match lasted less time than The Undertaker's entrance is laughable. It worries me, ever-so-slightly where this leaves John Cena's legacy. I mean, with his long history of Championships and honours, he looked scared stiff of a guy who's not wrestled in a year (yes all storyline, but still). I get that this was to give Taker 'a last hurrah', but for what? The streak is over, and beating Cena certainly isn't going to reignite a career that dragged on longer than it should have, anyway. This match would have been excellent in 2008, but not in 2018. Pointless.

Daniel Bryan & Shane McMahon v Sami Zayn & Kevin Owens - Career Match: This is an odd one for me. I was so excited to hear that Daniel Bryan was cleared to wrestle once again. This match started off promising but wound down to a damp squib. The outcome was predictable. It will be interesting to see what direction they take KO/SZ and also where Daniel Bryan ends up..

Alexa Bliss v Nia Jax - Raw Women's Championship Match: A good solid match, Jax was a worthy winner. I think she'll hold the title for a while until Ronda Rousey is in a position to beat her and have an extensive title run. As for this match? Nothing spectacular and nothing poor.. overall solid and entertaining.

AJ Styles v Shinsuke Nakamura - WWE Championship Match (SmackDown): Overall a decent match, as with the Bliss/Jax match, nothing during the match of note, but nothing too disappointing. Solid enough but interesting that this was the last of the SmackDown matches leaving 2 RAW matches to close the show. I like AJ more than I like Nakamura but the heel turn at the end was interesting and, for me, the highest point of this bout.

Braun Stroman & Nicholas v The Bar - RAW Tag Team Championship Match: What you see is what you get with Braun Strowman. A big brute doing big brute things. Better as a loner than teamed up. So that's seemingly why he teamed up with what appeared to be 'some kid' from the audience. Strowman pummelled both Shamus & Cesaro, tagged Nicholas in to enter the ring and swiftly get back on the apron once again. Rumours surrounded the internet as to whether Nicholas was a 'Make A Wish' kid, which for me would have been justified.. but then it actually came out that he was 'just' the referee's son.. average match, average storyline, obvious outcome.

Roman Reigns v Brock Lesnar - Universal Championship Match (RAW): F5 - near fall, F5 - near fall, F5 - near fall, F5 - near fall, F5 - near fall, F5 - win. Did we expect anything else? Well yes, actually. With Dana White (UFC President) coming out last week with what seemed to be a feax pas and stating that Lesnar would imminently return to UFC, we all thought that he would drop the title and pack his bags. Not the case, unfortunately. 374 days with the belt.. but hardly ever on the live shows. As much as I'm coming round to liking Lesnar, his storyline gets old, quickly. I say this as a huge Roman Reigns fan, though. I genuinely thought that Reigns would have the belt. The way that he entered the arena, I'd guess that he only just found out that he wasn't to win the title minutes before his music hit. Thus causing him to say something to Lesnar for Lesnar to retaliate causing the injuries that Reigns suffered during the match. It certainly seemed 'off script' and all a little odd. Then we find out that Lesnar has re-signed with the WWE. I'm fascinated to see where this storyline goes, especially with another PPV in under 3 weeks.

All-in-all, I felt that this WrestleMania was decent enough, a solid B+ but no more. It missed the cut scenes and promos. It missed the celebrity appearances. It just seemed to me Match-Match-Match-Match. That's not a huge issue, but the promos and appearances are what make WrestleMania so different from ALL of the other WWE PPV's.

---