Recently, in Paris, we saw WWE’s first Premium Live Event (PLE) ever broadcast from France: Clash in Paris. An electric crowd helped elevate an already entertaining show into one of the best of the year, with six great matches that blew the roof off of Paris La Défense Arena, which is Europe’s largest indoor arena.
The show opened with Roman Reigns vs Bronson Reed, which was a match that went slightly too long with its post match angle, but was still a fun old school match. The crowd really helped elevate the match with their constant chanting and cheering at every move and near-fall building anticipation until Roman Reigns eventually came out on top, conquering Bronson Reed. Following the match we saw Bronson Reed and his partner Bron Breakker lay out Roman Reigns and take him out of action indefinitely. This helped set up them being ejected from helping their faction leader Seth Rollins in the main event of the show.
Following the hot opening match, we settled into a couple slower matches to cool off before the big matches to end the card. The Wyatt Sicks defeated the Street Profits to retain the WWE Tag Team Championship via cheating and Becky Lynch defeated Nikki Bella to retain the Women’s Intercontinental Title. Next Rusev vs Sheamus completely overdelivered as Rusev submitted Sheamus in a brutal match that involved lots of weapons, dangerous spots, and good old fashioned brawling. And the main event ended with Seth Rollins retaining the WWE World Heavyweight Championship over Jey Uso, LA Knight, and CM Punk thanks to the help of his wife, AJ Mendez.
The most interesting match of the night was the second to last match: Logan Paul vs John Cena. John Cena fresh off of a disappointing heel turn with lackluster matches, left many wondering if he still had it in him. If Cena could still be the Ace of the company, and at Summerslam a month ago, he proved himself as he put on a sensational match as he dropped the WWE Title to Cody Rhodes. On the other side of the match was Logan Paul, who some in the WWE have begun to find stale due to a perceived lack of character work and an in-ring style that relies too much on high flying “viral moves” instead of focusing on the fundamentals of wrestling. The stage was set for their match to make or break the future of Logan Paul in the WWE, because if he couldn’t hang with the best to ever do it, why is he still here? The match blew the audience away as Logan Paul and John Cena traded finisher after finisher, signature move after signature move. It felt like a game of constant one upsmanship as Cena seemed to fight against Logan Paul by saying that if Logan could steal moves from other wrestlers, that Cena could do it too. In a phenomenal finishing sequence we saw Logan Paul ultimately fall to John Cena after a couple Attitude Adjustments. It’s a match that will be thought about for a while, as Cena has limited time left, and it sucks to see him go when he clearly has a lot left in his tank, Logan Paul continues to somehow prove himself in the ring. It will be exciting to see the rest of Cena’s retirement tour, and how Logan Paul continues to evolve in the ring.
