Adam Page (c) vs. Bryan Danielson
AEW World Heavyweight Title Match
AEW Dynamite #118
Prudential Center – Newark, New Jersey, USA
Page comes out swinging right away, frustrated that he couldn’t put away Bryan in their previous encounter. Bryan plays mind games early on, doing jumping jacks and evading all of Page’s offense. Page throws himself into a topé suicida, but Danielson evades him again and sends him crashing arm-first into the barricade.
Page gets color after being sent into the steps, and Bryan works away at the cut by grinding it into the side of the stairs, hitting brutal uppercuts, and using those trusty elbow strikes. Danielson’s work on top is phenomenal, as he even makes a point of mocking the judges as Hangman’s being attended to by the doctors.
Bryan gets busted open himself following some gnarly headbutts, and the violence ramps up as Page pulls him into the post multiple times a la Danielson’s legendary battles with Nigel McGuinness. Page gets some sweet, sweet revenge, throwing in a few jumping jacks of his own as the medical staff attends to Bryan.
My biggest issue with this match is with the arm work. I would’ve liked Page’s injury to inhibit his feats of strength a bit more, making them shakier to give a sense of struggle and weight. Instead, he hits a top-rope fallaway slam, catches a dive from Bryan, and hits a Deadeye on the outside with ease, like he hadn’t had his arm worked over for a significant portion of the match.
Hangman goes for the Buckshot, but Bryan collapses and suckers him for a near-fall and a Cross Face attempt. It ends with both battered, neither willing to give an inch, trading headbutts. Page eventually keeps him down long enough to hit the Buckshot and that’s all she wrote.
A lesser version of one of the best matches of 2021, but still great in its own right and very much worthwhile.
Spinning Wheel Kick 
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