Virus vs. Stuka Jr., Arena Coliseo de Guadalajara, 8/30/11

Wow, after crying out for CMLL to give Virus more time to work they finally went and did it. Thank you, CMLL.

This was a wonderfully old-school match. The matwork was short and not much more than a feeling out process, but the rope exchanges and transitions were classic lucha and the slower, more deliberate pace had a strong resonance with me. The match didn't have a big arc, but in this particular case the simplity of the match outweighed the need to make it dramatic and I liked the fact that Virus was able to end the match cleanly and simply from a series of moves that Stuka should have kicked out from. You could probably argue that it made Stuka seem like more of a jobber than is usually portrayed in lucha, but it was worth it to be free from the trappings of the modern day style. I didn't really follow lucha last year, but more matches like this and I think I'll enjoy catching up on it over the New Year period.