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Thursday, December 26, 2024 Issue #7442
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Visit our website at http://www.wrestling-online.com
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//->> OPENING WORDS FROM THE EDITOR

Hope you all had a nice Christmas!


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//->> NEWS FROM THE WRESTLING-ONLINE NEWSWIRE
Web version at http://www.wrestling-online.com/

CONTINENTAL CLASSIC ROUND-ROBIN TOURNAMENT ENDS

- The final matches of the Continental Classic took place last night on the Christmas edition of Dynamite from the Hammerstein Ballroom. In the gold league, Will Ospreay defeated Brody King, putting Ospreay with nine points and King with six on the chart. The Darby Allin vs Ricochet match ended in a time-limit draw, with Ricochet increasing to 10 points and Allin with seven. The other remaining gold league match saw Komander defeat Claudio Castagnoli, with Komander earning his first three points while Castagnoli finished with nine. In the blue league, Kazuchika Okada beat Shelton Benjamin to earn three points and finish with 10 points overall while Benjamin remained with six. The final match was Kyle Fletcher defeated Daniel Garcia, with Fletcher moving to 12 points and Garcia staying put with seven.

SEMI FINAL MATCHES IN CONTINENTAL CLASSIC SET

- The Continental Classic semi final matches which will take place at Worlds End were revealed last night after the conclusion of the tournament. In the blue league, Kyle Fletcher topped the group with 12 points while Continental champion Kazuchika Okada was behind with 10 points. Ricochet topped the gold league with 10 points and Will Ospreay followed with nine. The semi finals will now see Fletcher taking on Ospreay and Ricochet taking on Okada, with the winners of the two matches then meeting later in the night for the Continental title. This year's Continental Classic tournament saw 12 AEW stars compete against each other in a round-robin tournament. Apart from the top two in each league, the blue league finished with Mark Briscoe with nine points, Daniel Garcia with seven, Shelton Benjamin with six, and The Beast Mortos with no points. The gold league also had Claudio Castagnoli with nine points, Darby Allin with seven, Brody King with six, and Komander with three.

TAZ RETURNS TO COMMENTARY

- Former ECW champion Taz made his return to the AEW commentary desk during last night's Christmas edition of Dynamite. Taz underwent knee replacement surgery in October and at the time wrapped up his AEW commentary duties at the end of September. It was alluded that Taz was attacked in the parking lot during the October 2 episode of Dynamite, an attack which was never shown on television but done to explain why Taz would be off television for weeks to follow. With Dynamite in New York, it was a quick and easy trip for the man known as the human suplex machine to make, although it's unclear if he will rejoin the commentary team weekly from now on.

TAY MELO RETURNING TO THE RING AFTER 22 MONTHS

- AEW star Tay Melo, who has not wrestled since March 3, 2023, will be returning to the ring for STARDOM in Japan at their New Year Dream 2025 event. The 29-year-old Brazilian will be teaming up with Mina Shirakawa to take on ROH Women's champion Athena and Thekla in a tag team match. Melo's last match at the NEW Wrestlefest XXVII event, teaming up with her husband Sammy Guevara to take on Encore and Tiara James. Her last AEW in-ring appearance was on the January 1, 2023 episode of Rampage in a street fight match, teaming up with Anna Jay in a losing effort against Ruby Soho and Willow Nightingale. Melo gave birth to a daughter in late November of the same year.

COLLISION RATING

- Helped by a big lead-in from the college football game which drew 8.6 million viewers, Collision on Saturday night drew 635,000 viewers, up a whopping 389,000 viewers from the previous week. This was the most-watched Collision of 2024 by a mile and the best number since July 29, 2023 and the third most-watched Collision ever. The show had a 0.20 rating in 18-49, up 0.11 from the previous week and also a year-high. It was #3 on the top 50 cable chart for the night. (Ratings credit: Programming Insider)

LIV MORGAN APPEARS ON NFL NETFLIX GAME

- While CM Punk did WWE promotion during the Steelers vs Chiefs NFL pre-game show on Netflix, WWE Women's World champion Liv Morgan did her appearance on the second game later in the day. Morgan showed up at the Houston Texans vs Baltimore Ravens game to promote WWE's arrival on Netflix which is now just two weeks away. Interviewed on the field while holding the title on her shoulder, Morgan said if someone had told her she would be on Netflix weekly years ago, she would have cried tears of happiness. "This is so huge, the fact that WWE and Netflix are joining together to give all the WWE fans across the globe the opportunity to watch WWE Monday Night Raw in the same place for the first time ever, debuting on Netflix January 6th, we're so excited and we can't wait for everyone to watch us," Morgan said.

RAW RATING

- Raw this week drew 1,453,000 viewers, down 80,000 viewers from last week's broadcast against Monday Night Football's 14.6 million audience for the Saints vs Packers game which was simulcast on ABC, ESPN, and ESPN2. The first hour did 1,448,000 viewers and then the second hour climbed slightly to 1,458,000 viewers. The show had a 0.42 rating in 18-49, down 0.05 from last week's show and the lowest since October 28. Raw was #3 on the top 50 cable chart for the night behind NFL shows and #5 overall in all of television. (Ratings credit: Programming Insider)

WWE HOLIDAY TOUR KICKS OFF TODAY

- The annual WWE holiday tour kicks off today with ten events in five days. The fun starts with two events, one at Madison Square Garden in New York and the other at the VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena in Jacksonville. On Friday it's a live event at the PPG Paints Arena in Pittsburgh and a live Smackdown from the Amalie Arena in Tampa. Saturday the action moves to Orlando at the Kia Center and at the CFG Bank Arena in Baltimore. On Sunday it's live from the Allstate Arena in Chicago and Kaseya Center in Miami. It all ends on Monday night with one event at the Little Caesars Arena in Detroit and a live Raw at the same time in Houston at the Toyota Center. Tickets are available for all shows at Ticketmaster.com.

WWE TO ROCK MSG WITH TRADITIONAL BOXING DAY SHOW

- Over 11,000 fans will be on hand for the traditional Boxing Day non-televised live event at the world's most famous arena - Madison Square Garden - for today's WWE Holiday Tour. It is going to be a loaded show headlined by a steel cage match for the World Heavyweight title between Gunther and Damian Priest. Liv Morgan will defend the Women's World title against Iyo Sky and Bron Breakker also puts up his Intercontinental title on the line against Sami Zayn in a two-out-of-three falls match. Seth Rollins will battle Dominik Mysterio and CM Punk makes a rare non-televised appearance against Ludwig Kaiser. Other stars scheduled to appear include The Miz, Wyatt Sicks, The New Day, LA Knight, Drew McIntyre, and more.

OMOS TO APPEAR AT PRO WRESTLING NOAH JANUARY 1 SHOW

- Pro Wrestling NOAH today announced that WWE Superstar Omos will be at their upcoming January 1 The New Year 2025 event which will take place at Nippon Budokan in Tokyo. With 10 matches already announced for the show, it's unclear if Omos will be part of another match or just making an appearance. Omos last wrestled on the April 5 episode of Smackdown on the eve of WrestleMania during the Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal. He remains under WWE contract but has not been used since then, although he does do media appearances for the company from time to time. Fellow WWE Superstar Shinsuke Nakamura will also be at the January 1 event and will take on Ulka Sasaki in a singles match. The WWE United States title will not be on the line. NOAH The New Year 2025 will air as a pay-per-view on the Abema streaming service. Abema also airs all WWE programming in Japan.

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