{"id":66732,"date":"2020-04-15T13:43:15","date_gmt":"2020-04-15T17:43:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonprowrestling.com\/?p=66732"},"modified":"2020-04-15T13:43:15","modified_gmt":"2020-04-15T17:43:15","slug":"preview-wwe-nxt-4-15-20","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2020\/04\/15\/preview-wwe-nxt-4-15-20\/","title":{"rendered":"Preview: WWE NXT (4\/15\/20)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last week’s NXT<\/strong> featured just three matches – only two of which were promoted beforehand.\u00a0 Io Shirai<\/strong> was crowned number one contender for Charlotte<\/strong>‘s NXT Women’s Championship.\u00a0 Johnny Gargano<\/strong> overcame long-time friend-and-foe, Tommaso Ciampa<\/strong>, to end their legendary feud with a victory. This week features the beginnings of a tournament<\/a> to crown an interim NXT Cruiserweight Champion.\u00a0 The billed main event features Finn Balor<\/strong> squaring off with Imperium<\/strong> member, Fabian Aichner<\/strong>.\u00a0 Whether more matches get added to the show is anyone’s guess.\u00a0 Of course, with the COVID-19 epidemic raging on, this is another behind-closed-doors episode of NXT.\u00a0 Without further ado, let us dive right in!<\/p>\n

Interim Cruiserweight Championship Tournament Begins<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\"\"
Photo: WWE<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Current NXT Cruiserweight Champion, Jordan Devlin<\/strong>, is currently affected by the COVID travel ban.\u00a0 Therefore, an interim champion is needed and WWE have announced eight possible replacements.\u00a0 Kushida<\/strong>, Drake Maverick*<\/strong>, Tony Nese<\/strong> and Jake Atlas<\/strong> make up Group A.\u00a0 Group B consists of Isaiah “Swerve” Scott<\/strong>, El Hijo del Fantasma<\/strong>, Akira Tozawa<\/strong> and Gentleman Jack Gallagher<\/strong>.\u00a0 Only Tony Nese has captured the title before, though Tozawa and Gallagher share the distinction of being “originals” of the division.\u00a0 El Hijo del Fantasma is an exciting, second-generation luchador – formerly King Cuerno<\/strong> of Lucha Underground<\/strong> fame.\u00a0 Fantasma will be making his debut in the tournament and will be looking to make an immediate impact.\u00a0 Overall, this is an exciting looking tournament loaded<\/em> with talent.\u00a0 Who wins is anyone’s guess, but expect Fantasma and Kushida to go the distance.<\/p>\n

*It has recently been announced that Drake Maverick has been released.\u00a0 Stay tuned for more on this story.<\/p>\n

Fabian Aichner vs Finn Balor<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The advertised main event sees Finn Balor come face-to-face with Fabian Aichner in an inter-European match.\u00a0 The Italian Aichner versus the Irish Balor.\u00a0 Aichner recently spoke with PWInsider<\/strong> and was clearly excited about the prospect of facing a star of Balor’s caliber.<\/p>\n

Fabian on Balor<\/strong><\/h3>\n

“To me it\u2019s\u2026 Finn is among the biggest names that I\u2019ve ever wrestled, with Seth Rollins and Kevin Owens when we did Raw last year.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Balor, of course, will be looking to continue his strong run of form.\u00a0 In recent weeks, he has defeated Kenny Williams<\/strong>, Alexander Wolfe<\/strong> and NXT North American Champion, Keith Lee<\/strong>, albeit via disqualification.\u00a0 Finn has been nothing short of unstoppable since returning to the NXT brand last year, with an angrier, vicious version of his character.\u00a0 Balor’s feud with WALTER<\/strong> and Imperium<\/strong> has given us a new, refreshing feud and this week’s match should be another exciting chapter of a pretty great story.\u00a0 Whether Balor can score another win on his road to a potential NXT UK Championship run remains to be seen.\u00a0 The only way to find out if he can do it is by tuning into NXT on USA Network<\/em> tonight.<\/p>\n

Stay tuned to the\u00a0Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/a>\u00a0for more on this and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world, as well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world.\u00a0 WWE fan? You can check out an almost unlimited array of WWE and NXT content on the\u00a0WWE Network<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last week’s NXT featured just three matches – only two of which were promoted beforehand.\u00a0 Io Shirai was crowned number one contender for Charlotte‘s NXT Women’s Championship.\u00a0 Johnny Gargano overcame long-time friend-and-foe, Tommaso Ciampa, to end their legendary feud with a victory. This week features the beginnings of a tournament to crown an interim NXT […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2482,"featured_media":66806,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,5,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-nxt","category-wwe-universe"],"modified_by":"Niklas George","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2482"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66732"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66732\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66806"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}