Welcome one and all to a look over the last week of the British grapple game. This week has been especially humbling for me as I got the chance to interview Britain’s top wrestler and WWE star William Regal which will go down as one of the highlights of my wrestling journalistic career. Don’t worry though I will as always be giving you a full run down of the news making the news this week as well as of course talking about the one and only William Regal.
On Wednesday I packed my bags and said goodbye to the circus, well the countryside really and went in to the big smoke to interview William Regal. I was lucky enough to be granted thirty minutes of his time to grill him with all the questions you guys had sent in. I will never forget that day he was a top bloke and although there to promote the WWE and his book he had a lot to say on the British wrestling scene and some of the British talent currently coming through the ranks of the WWE. So be sure to keep checking back at wrestling101 for this major exclusive during the week for when the interview goes live.
Keeping with the WWE, they closed out their UK tour with style this week as they brought us the live tapings of Raw and Smackdown from the Birmingham NEC. These events were once again bombarded with people in the UK scene handing out flyers and trying to promote their product but more important were some of the UK wrestlers who got to step in to the ring.
Over the two nights in televised and non televised matches Robbie Brookside, Mikey Whiplash, Steve Lewington, Domino, Andy Baker and Eric Shultz appeared in Birmingham all of who are either UK workers or done a lot of work in the UK. According to rumours Thunder was on standby both nights and it was also rumoured that Paul Burchill was in the UK but was not used. It’s good to see that now the WWE are doing tapings over here that they are using UK talent and especially for the likes of Mikey Whiplash who was on the main Smackdown show against Matt Morgan. Well done to all those guys for getting on the shows and I hope it helps further your careers.
The weeks are going on and still no celebrity from the celebrity wrestling programme has taken up UK wrestler Scott Future’s challenge to a proper match. With the support of many wrestling fans and wrestlers including respect from Rowdy Roddy Piper who features on the programme. The UK Pitbulls accepted the challenge on behalf of the celebrities but Scott is desperate to fight one of the celebrities as it is with the celebrities he has an axe to grind. Remember to check out the Future-Shock columns here at Wrestling 101 written by the man himself for all the updates.
The participants have now been announced for the British Inter-Federation cup which takes place at WAW May Mayhem III. Team WAW will be managed by Sweet Saraya and she has brought in the whole family to represent WAW as Ricky Knight, Zebra Kid and Kid Zodiac take up the challenge. Greg Lambert has picked a formidable team to go against them and represent FWA as he drafts in Doug Williams, Spud and James Tighe. That won’t be the only FWA involvement of the night as Alex Shane challenges the Dark Angel Ashe for his WAW British heavyweight title. It’s sure to be a cracking event on May 28th in Bournemouth.
A host of UK stars were in Germany this weekend for EWP as they promoted three events in three days from Hannover. Robbie Brookside, Drew McDonald, Thunder, Flatliner and Dave Taylor all participated on the tour. On the last night Robbie Brookside retained his EWP intercontinental against US wrestling legend Tracey Smothers. Well done to all those guys on another successful tour.
IPW:UK have announced they will be hosting a ladder match on their next card from the Orpington Halls on May 22nd. After a rocky Star Daniel Edler has stuck with IPW:UK and the venue and his perseverance is paying off as the events and crowds go from strength to strength. The ladder match will see Aviv Maayan continuing his feud with Stevie Douglas with the stipulations being if Aviv win Stevie is fired but if Stevie win he get’s Aviv’s number one contender spot for the IPW:UK title. The main event for the card is also looking interesting as James Tighe, Andy Simmonz and Drew Galloway are all preparing to perform.
My good friends the UK Pitbulls emailed me this week with the line up to the next DAM show and it is looking good. The show features a table match between Ricky Knight and Zebra Kid which should be off the hook a 6 man tag that involves a man who has made a name for himself in RBW Sammy Ray as well as the UK Pitbulls themselves putting the DAM tag titles on the line against Andy Simmons and Eamon O’Neil all of this and a WAWW guest match you can’t ask for more. The show takes place on May 20th from The Holt Community Centre in Norfolk.
If you believe what you read on the Internet forums and read into recent press releases there seems to be a rivalry developing in Ireland between the IWW wrestling gym run as part of the FWA schools and the new CPW set up by Blake Norton. Over the last few years Ireland is finally starting to develop a proper British wrestling scene of its own guys please don’t let this rivalry escalate by trying to win points off each other as I would hate to see all the good work undone.
I want to end this week by saying a fond farewell from the UK wrestling scene to Gary Graham. I know I’m not top of his list of favourite wrestling journalists but the UK Scene doesn’t ever want to lose anyone that invested the time and money in it. I’m also sad for the reasons Gary left the business as someone else got involved to sway Gary’s decision it wasn’t Gary deciding this was his time to leave.
WZW had its critics like any other wrestling promotion but like them or hate them they put on regular shows that never got cancelled and for which the advertised wrestlers were actually on the card. For your effort and enthusiasm the UK Scene team here at Wrestling 101 would like to thank you very much. Now go back to hating me, having a good life outside of wrestling and happiness with your family.
Remember the William Regal interview will be up next week and to get you in the mood here is a prelude to part 1 of this half-hour interview that took place last week:
In part one we talk about his life before WWE and how he turned his life around from the downward spiral which could have seen him going to an early grave.
“I passed out one night and I didn’t know the paramedics had come and that my heart had stopped five times, they had to restart my heart five times, I had died five times.”
“I came to a realisation the day I sorted myself out was the day I stopped making excuses for myself and it was no good sitting there fell sorry for myself.”
We talked about the early days of his career and the popularity of wrestling back in the days of World of Sport.
“People can knock Big Daddy all they want but he was a legitimate superstar with 17 million people watching him.”
And Finally in part 1 we look to the future.
“I don’t even worry about it I will end up where I end up, probably selling newspapers outside of the Opera House in Blackpool.”
If that’s not all as part of the launch for William Regal’s new book The quizzical one himself Daniel Evans will be giving us his review of this literary gem and on top of that we have a signed copy of the book to give away. To find out what you have to do to get your hands on it you have to log in next week and read part 1 of when Adam Sibley met William Regal.
Until next time,