The match began with a Madison Square Garden mic unit hanging from the ceiling. Howard Finkel's voice introduced the competitors.
They locked up and struggled for control until Randy Orton slammed Edge's face into the mat. The Rated-R Superstar hit a few deep arm drags before his rival countered the last one.
The Viper kept him grounded in a headscissor hold but Edge escaped. Every time it looked like he would take the upper hand, Orton slithered out of his grasp.
The Ultimate Opportunist took him down in a hammerlock. They continued to use mostly technical offense as they countered and reversed each other every step of the way.
A headbutt from Edge caused Orton to start bleeding from his forehead. The old Edge began to emerge as he smiled seeing the damage he had done. The Viper hit his signature backbreaker to turn the tables and kept focusing on Edge's neck by sending him into the barricade and steel steps.
After a long struggle, Edge came back with three suplexes in a row as an homage to Eddie Guerrero. They traded chest chops as they got back to their feet. The Viper hit a huge superplex to put himself back in the driver's seat.
The Rated-R Superstar dropped Orton with an Edgecution for a near-fall. At this point, it started to drag on a bit. They slowed the pace down considerably as The Viper set up for the RKO. Edge countered and hit the Edge-O-Matic for a two-count. He even used Christian's Unprettier but still couldn't keep Orton down. The Viper used a Pedigree with the same result.
Orton was stunned when Edge kicked out of the RKO, but The Rated-R Superstar was just as shocked when he failed to win with two Spears in a row. The Viper drilled him with a Punt to finally get the pin.
Edge and Orton took the "greatest wrestling match ever" title seriously. They used more mat-based offense than we have seen either of them employ in years.
While everything they did was fluid, it didn't feel like we were watching Edge and Orton until about halfway through the match. It felt like we were watching them try to wrestle like Daniel Bryan, which is not what these two Superstars usually do.
Once they started using more strikes and power moves, we started to see more signature moves from their respective repertoires.
The crowd noise WWE piped in was often more distracting than it should have been, but Edge and Orton were still able to have an incredible match.
Was this the greatest match ever? No, but it was really good and that is the best we could have hoped for.
