So… that happened. World Wrestling Entertainment politely entered Glasgow, with the week packed with Drew McIntyre seemingly doing everything but sleep, from media, being inducted into the Scottish Wrestling Hall of Fame, wrestling on Smackdown in a dark match against Sheamus, to Kick Off shenanigans, appearing at ICW at 2am on Saturday morning, then Clash At The Castle itself as his Scottish accent got thicker and thicker as the days went on.

I dipped in and out of Smackdown on Friday so will probably not have anything up about that show itself, possibly the same with Insane Championship Wrestling’s After Hours event following Smackdown. Staying up to 3.30am is probably not the best idea at my age and I did slightly fall asleep during one of the matches but arose for the main event of big meaty ladies slapping meat. Will I revisit it to do a proper write up? Probably not but I did enjoy Kenny Williams against Robbie X in the opener and Arcade Violence against Yorkshire Tough, the rest was a little bit of a blur to be honest as fatigue set in.

So of course I will be staying up to watch Night Two in about an hour. No rest for the stupid clearly.

All of that to say, here are some relatively fresh thoughts about Clash At The Castle emanating from the OVO Hydro in Glasgow while I emanated from my living room in Elgin. The order of things are probably inaccurate but I’ll run through some highlights.

Undisputed WWE Championship – I Quit Match – Cody Rhodes defeated AJ Styles to retain the Undisputed WWE Championship.

Following a genuinely interesting countdown panel that included packages on “Rowdy” Roddy Piper, a British wrestling lesson from William Regal, and plenty of Big E gyrating, which made the two hours flew by, the main show kicked off properly with the Undisputed WWE Championship match between Cody Rhodes and AJ Styles.

My base knowledge of the how’s and why’s the match was happening was covered extensively through the pre-show countdown, and the kick off event at the SECC, so I understood that these fellas have a little bit of beef that needs carving.

After a roof shaking WOA-OH from the 11k in attendance, it went straight into the action with Cody avoiding the opening tie up to drop down and uppercut Styles to the throat. Striking with intent from the outset.

Both men ended up cut up as Styles introduced handcuffs to the chants of “kinky bastard”. Styles cuffed up Rhodes, leaving him prone for a chain wrapped Phenomenal Forearm but Cody threw a chair into the face of a perch AJ who fell off the apron into a conveniently placed table that appeared earlier in the contest.

Cody nabbed the keys to uncuff himself, after Styles had endured three slaps from Mama Rhodes at ringside.

After three Cross Rhodes, including the third on a chair, Cody cuffed AJ to the second rope and leathered him with a chair over and over before grabbing the ring steps. As he threatened to bludgeon Styles, AJ shouted that he quit as the fear was evident.

After approval from Mama Rhodes, Cody hit AJ with the steps anyway, what a sore winner.

Maybe not the most threatening or cutting I Quit matches ever but with a loud crowd getting into the action it made the big moments more monumental. A great opener. Gallows and Anderson were nowhere to be seen and the camera missed the final blow with the steel steps so had to rely on the replay.

As Cody reached the top of the entrance way Solo Sikoa appeared for a very lukewarm staredown before Tonga Loa and Tama Tonga arrived to beat down the champion. Randy Orton and Kevin Owens ran out to save the day to handily set up a six man tag team match at Money in the Bank probably.

WWE Women’s Tag Team Championships – Triple Threat – Alba Fyre & Isla Dawn defeated Bianca Belair & Jade Cargill, and Shayna Baszler & Zoey Stark by pinfall to WIN the WWE Women’s Tag Team Championships.

In an interesting change for WWE triple threat tag team matches, the match would start with a triple threat and the combatants could only tag their own tag team partner.

The action was thick and fast because of these changes with it getting a bit haphazard in moments. Jade Cargill didn’t seem to have her fair share of luck with slips, trips, and it appearing that she tapped out of a choke from Shayna Baszler that was only saved by referee Jess Carr being out of position to witness it.

The challengers all agreed to take out the champions with Alba Fyre looking outstanding with a Swanton to the outside after running up the ropes in the corner. It didn’t take long for that to breakdown to have all three teams going after each other again with Alba getting the worse end of a tower of doom situation.

Belair and Jade hit their codebreaker/wheelbarrow combo to Shayna but Isla Dawn chucked out Cargill to steal the pin for herself.

As far as standouts go, Bianca Belair, Alba Fyre, and even Zoey Stark who hit a nice springboard twisting splash, really showed up for their teams. As noted Jade seemed to be unlucky, with Shayna and Isla providing fine performances.

Arguably it was one of the more shocking upsets of the evening with Fyre and Dawn coming in as underdogs when you consider the champions being the formidable force of Bianca Belair and Jade Cargill.

A feel good result for the home crowd seeing Alba Fyre, a beloved figure in Scottish wrestling who had suffered tragedy recently, lift gold. To see her and Isla win the titles and literally receive their flowers was a touching moment.

WWE Intercontinental Championship – Sami Zayn defeated Chad Gable w/Maxxine Dupri & Otis by pinfall to retain the WWE Intercontinental Championship.

Back to the singalong with Sami Zayn’s entrance theme getting the Glasgow treatment as it rightly should.

Gable went on the attack by first going for the ankle before turning towards the shoulder of Zayn. It eventually devolved into Gable trying to get his plan into action but giving Maxxine the title belt and distracting the referee, but she refused. After a berating on the apron, Sami narrowly missed booting Dupri in the face with the follow up Chaos Theory rolling German Suplex garnering a long two count.

Otis refused to partake in the cheating which brought Gable back to the outside. Gable continued to intimidate Maxxine until Otis stepped in between the two to garner a loud reaction. Sami flew over the top rope but crashed into Otis which allowed Gable to retain control.

As the match continued Gable held onto the ankle lock while Sami was draped over the barricade. Zayn countered but in the process sent Chad into chopblocking poor Maxxine’s injured leg. Otis picked up Dupri to take her to the back and in the distraction Zayn hit a Helluva Kick for the win.

Another shock result, it looked like it was finally Chad Gable’s time but his use of one of those famous three i’s (intensity) came back to bite him.

He glared at Sami while the champion motioned that their story was over. I’m very interested to see where this goes next. I loved the story but the match also maintained a great flow throughout.

WWE Women’s Championship – Bayley defeated Piper Niven w/Chelsea Green by pinfall to retain the WWE Women’s Championship.

In the second of three Scottish inclusive championship contests, Piper was joined by a tartan adorned Chelsea Green, which was very nice.

Bayley got a big reaction that almost seemed to overshadow Piper Niven, at least that’s how it sounded through the tv.

Piper used her power game to great effect by battering the champion with big splashes, along with a Michinoku driver that looked to wrap it up but Bayley held on. Bayley fought back with a second rope Bayley-to-Belly.

Chelsea tried to get involved but Charles Robinson sent her packing. Later a masked luchadore arrived (sources say her name was Chel-Si Verde) to cause a further distraction.

In the melee after dispatching the masked unknown, Bayley hit a crucifix bomb on Niven to get the pin outta nowhere.

It was gutting to see Piper lose. The story that she told about always being the weird wrestling kid being accepted into the big mad world of wrestling and reaching the stage where she is fighting for a title in her home country is set up for a massive pay off but it wasn’t to be. Bayley maintains ever popular with the UK audience which made the crowd quite split in reaction.

World Heavyweight Championship – The Judgement Day Barred From Ringside – Damien Priest defeated Drew McIntyre by pinfall to retain the World Heavyweight Championship.

Like the rocket Sid receives in Toy Story, this was The Big One. Drew entered to a 106db roar after bagpipers played Scotland The Brave.

Damien Priest entered cool, calm, and collected. Not letting the emotion and overwhelming pressure get to him, at least on the outside. Especially when Drew stepped in front of Priest during his ring announcement.

It was a physical contest with big clotheslines being thrown. Along with the big lads throwing each other with sit out slams. The action seemed to grind to a halt when Priest got his leg caught in the ropes while attempting to fly over the top rope to the outside.

Priest looked to favour his ankle going forward yet somehow managed to hit an impressive Razor’s Edge. The match went to the outside with McIntyre hitting a Claymore to send Priest through the timekeepers area.

The referee got knocked off the apron while returning to the ring with Drew hitting a Claymore that looked to seal the deal. We expected some Judgement Day shenanigans, we expected something but maybe not what happened next.

McIntyre called for a referee, as a striped adorned figure appeared to count 1… 2… but stopped short as Drew realised who was there in front of him. CM Punk.

McIntyre grabbed Punk and backed him into the corner, Punk returned in kind with a low blow which allowed Priest to hit a South of Heaven and the original referee recovered to make the three count. Damien Priest retained in Scotland.

Certainly not the fairy tale ending we hoped for as the loud crowd were deflated when the three count was made. As Punk smugly looked on, I don’t think the crowd could quite believe it happened. No riots, just disbelief.

As match, it was a gutsy performance from Damien Priest, who has chalked a big mark on his inaugural world title reign. It felt inevitable that Drew McIntyre would hold the World Heavyweight Championship high, but CM Punk played spoiler.

The fuel continues to be added to the fire for the eventual CM Punk and Drew McIntyre showdown.

An enjoyable show even if the results didn’t go the way I expected. It certainly played into the old, paraphrased, adage of anything can happen in the World Wrestling Entertainment.

The crowd were fantastic as expected. The matches delivered in the majority, with plenty of surprises that we might have to digest before deciding if they were for good or bad.

Glasgow gave a great account of themselves to give reason for WWE to return here in the future. Hopefully it won’t be too long.