10 Best Ever Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat Matches

9. Vs. Steve Austin - WCW Clash Of The Champions 28

A year finishing up with the Blonds, Steamboat found himself in a singles rivalry with Steve Austin over the WCW United States Championship. 

Ageing like a fine wine, The Dragon may have been in the winter of his career but he hadn't lost a step and still made everything he did look effortless. 

The pair had a few notable battles over the title in the summer of '94, but I think their match from August's Clash of the Champions XXVIII is their best bout together. 

Stunning Steve had notably stepped his game up after working extensively with one of the best to ever lace up a pair of boots and looked like a real ring general as he went move for move and counter for counter with Steamboat. 

They started with some great mat wrestling before Austin took control and worked his opponent over. Steamboat kept fighting back and showed real fire in his comebacks, a staple of his wrestling persona. 

The whole finishing sequence, with a series of airtight near-falls, is exquisite professional wrestling and Ricky's title-winning victory was a true feel-good moment that the fans in attendance clearly enjoyed a lot. 

Incredibly, Steamboat wrestled much of the match with a seriously injured back, an injury he suffered when taking a bad bump off the second rope. It was so bad that this was actually his last (televised) match for almost fifteen years as he threw in the towel and called it a career just days later.  

If you're going to go out, you may as well go out on a match as good as this one.