Preston City Wrestling SpringSlam Evoque Nightclub, Preston - Review by Claire Davidson

Friday 25^th April

What can I say about this show....it was nothing short of spectacular.  I thought it would be difficult for a show to equal the BCW show of the previous week but there was no fear of that, this was definitely the best show I have EVER seen.
When you are walking through the nightclub and into the room where the wrestling is held, you can feel the electric atmosphere building.  With PCW, it is only the first two rows that are seating and you are allocated seats so if you book tickets as a group, you stay together.  So when I got to my seat, saw that it was plastic and in line with the centre of the ring.....I knew it was going to be a very interesting night...

Just as ring announcer Joanna Rose had come out to announce the first match, she was interrupted by the PCW Champion Joey Hayes.  He gets into the ring and starts saying he does not understand why the fans love Danny Hope so much, this gets the crowd chanting ‘Tassle-tastic’.  He then rants that how he was a good guy just like Danny but what did he get from the fans...nothing but disrespect and boos!  He went on to proclaim that he doesn’t need to wrestle Danny tonight and that he will just stand outside the ring and get counted out so he retains the title.  At this point PCW owner, Steven Fludder, comes out and tells Joey that it will not be that easy and makes the Title Match a lumberjack match!

Martin Kirby vs AR Fox
I wasn’t sure what to expect from this match.  I am a huge fan of Kirby but AR Fox was an unknown entity, I have never seen any of his work, he did not disappoint.  The crowd were definitely split with joint ‘Martin Kirby’,’ARFox’  chants.  In the early stages of the match was going back and forward with Kirby using ‘C’mon ref, he’s pulling my hair!’  Some the high flying moves AR Fox was executing  were totally mind blowing, Kirby gave as good as he got.  After a hugely entertaining match, Kirby pins AR Fox for the win.

Noam Dar vs Steve Corino
A majority of the crowd were behind Noam Dar for the match.  Giving a Noam Dar rendition of ‘No Limits’ and the Imperial March from Star Wars (to which Noam started marching round the ring).  Before the match started, Noam asked who would like to hold his jacket, of course, I had to offer my services for this job but he made me promise to give it back and he tried to get the fans to chant my name but failed miserable!  When the match got start, the size difference between the two was very noticeable and Noam had a little difficulty trying to get his opponent down.  He did manage to land a few cheeky slaps to which Corino called him a cheeky little “monkey”! After a good match in which Noam had a couple of near submissions, Steve Corino pick up the win by pinfall.  Noam was not a happy person after getting beat, he storms out the ring, grabs his jacket off me with a ‘Gie’s ma f****n jacket’ and marches backstage like a petulant child!

Dave Mastiff vs Charlie Garrett I believe this match had come about due to what happened during the rumble at the previous event.  This is the first time I had even heard of Charlie Garrett, not one who has been on my radar!  I must admit when he entered the ring he looked very impressive.  The crowd were very much behind Dave Mastiff for the fight  with the chant ‘You’re our favourite b*****d’!  It was during this match, things started getting scary, on a couple of occasions I made a dash from where I was sitting as Garrett landed where my feet would have been!  The power of Dave Mastiff was unbelievable, it looked like Garrett was running into a brick wall as his shoulder charges made little or no impact on Mastiff.  At one point Mastiff was on the outside of the ring and Garrett tried to baseball slide him but Mastiff trapped him in the ring apron.  Mastiff pins Garrett after giving him the cannonball!

Team Single vs Legion of Boom & Dean Allmark
This match was not announced prior to the night.  Originally it was supposed to be Bubblegum vs Dean Allmark but Bubblegum could not come to the ring without the Tag Champions and other members of Team Single T-Bone and Rampage Brown.  All three men descended upon Dean Allmark but before they could reach him, out came Legion of Boom (Dave Rayne & Chris Masters) making this a six-man tag match.  Legion of Boom are definitely the fans favourite in this match.  At the start, Allmark wanted Bubblegum to face him but he refused and told T-Bone to go in first.  After a few tags from each team, Team Single manage to get the better of Legion of Boom and Allmark by stopping Dave Rayne tagging in any of his partners and takes a beating in their corner with some underhand tactics from Team Single!  Eventually Dave manages to get a second wind when he is up against Bubblegum and manages to tag in his partner which leads to Team Single entering the ring.  After the melee, the team of Legion of Doom and Dean Allmark are victorious.

El Ligero vs Petey Williams
I was really looking forward to this match, El Ligero is becoming one of my favourite wrestlers.  He impresses me more every time I see him and makes me want to see more of him.  In this match, the crowd was split in who to support.  Soon after the crowd were quiet, only the odd shout, which clearly did not take away how good the two stars in the ring.  Both were so equally match throughout, it was a tough one to call.  After a few near falls, Petey hit El Ligero with the Canadian Destroyer to score the win by pin.

Kris Travis vs Prince Fergal Devitt
For me, this was MOTN by far.  I know I could be accused of being biased since I am a massive fan of Kris Travis and even writing this my heart is skipping beats!  First Trav come out to rapturous applause from the crowd....then out comes Devitt with the Punisher bodyart!  Right from the start this is a fast paced match, with both men exchanging blow.  Devitt’s chops would rival BT Gunn’s, if I am being honest, the echoes around the nightclub were immense but I had to spare a thought for the guy on the receiving end of them.  Trav took the upper hand and gave the signal...I ran!! First Devitt comes flying, quickly followed by Trav, chairs went flying along with my bag, jacket and phone, I am glad it is made with sturdy stuff! Next Devitt grabs Trav and tries to Irish Whip him into the wall but Trav is wise to this and runs up the wall and back flips over Devitt...but I thought there was a slight under rotation and Trav was off balance when he landed.  The two men continued to fight around the ring, chairs continued to fly and my heart was constantly in my mouth, scared in case someone got hurt!  Unfortunately there could only be one winner and that went to Prince Fergal Devitt by pin.  This match well and truly deserved the standing ovation and chants of ‘That was Awesome ‘ and ‘One more time’.  I did get a high five from Trav as he left the ring that made my night!

After the match, they brought Jesse McClure and Elizabeth Fludder out to draw the raffle.  Jesse asked who we supported in Storage Hunters.  When we booed Brandori, he asked security to banish us from the building.  I didn’t win anything this time!

MAIN EVENT – LUMBERJACK MATCH
Joey Hayes (Champion) vs Danny Hope
Before the match they brought out the lumberjacks T-Bone, Rampage Brown, Bubblegum, Dave Rayne, Chris Masters, Terry Funk, Big Van Vader and Rikishi.

This was a good match with action in and out the ring.  Team Single was standing right in front of us but I have never seen a bigger chicken than Bubblegum!!!  Hiding behind us at every opportunity, especially when one of the other lumberjacks came near him.  In the ring it was back and forth, Joey was thrown from the ring on the far side but was quickly back in when Masters and Vader started pounding down on him!  I did ask Bubblegum at this point, if anyone comes this way to give me warning so I don’t get injured and was told no because he would be standing behind me!  More toing and froing in the ring with Danny being ejected at our side but as team single go to beat him down, round come all the other lumberjack to save him.  Terry Funk then starts to beat down T-bone then Bubblegum with the latter landing on his backside, Funk also gave Rayne a punch into the bargain.  At this point, I didn’t know where to look...as T-bone had started attacking Terry Funk.  Finally Joey Hayes got the win to retain the title.  Team Single had started to celebrate with him, then the other lumberjacks entered the ring, Vader attacked Joey and whipped him in the corner, this clearly knocked Joey!! The fans started baying for the Rikishi’s stink face which he was glad to give Hayes a taste of! This was followed up by a Vader bomb!  Luckily for Joey he managed to get out of there before any more punishment could be bestowed on him.

After the matched we were entertained by some dancing from Rikishi, Vader, Funk, Masters, Rayne and Hope!

The show was out of this world, not one bad fight amongst the seven of them.  The only thing I could criticise is that there were too many imports but I would highly recommend this company to any wrestling fan out there.


Claire Davidson

 

 

BCW Live at The Grand Hall, Kilmarnock Review

Saturday 19 April 2014

OMG!! I mean O.....M.....G!!!!!
If you got a thesaurus and looked up every alternative for the word awesome there still wouldn't be enough words to emphasise just how amazing this show was....I mean if Carlsberg did wrestling shows, they probably would have had the card that Graham McKay produced here .....and it didn't even include Jester!!  Ok, so I guess I am raving a little bit, but when you go to a lot of the shows, you obviously see a lot of the same faces at each show, but this show had a perfect mix of regulars, semi-regulars and new faces that made almost every match something new.  We were really looking forward to seeing Prince Devitt for the first time and Rob even painted up his face in honour of him.

First up we had Kris Travis against Noam Dar.  Both these guys had been part of PWE's instant classic tag match back in March and this match did not disappoint. Noam picked a member of the audience to look after his jacket, borrowing a camera from official photographer David Wilson to take the lad's picture before the match started.  Both guys gave it all in the match, giving and taking some punishment and the match went back and forward between them, with both scoring near pins before Dar finally took the win.  While in this instance I was cheering for Dar, it is getting harder and harder to not cheer Kris Travis who, despite his "I love me, who do you love?" persona is just a bloody amazing wrestler that you want to cheer!

Next we had a tag team title match between champions Just Uz (BT Gunn & Stevie Xavier) and Hubba Bubba Lucha (El Ligero & Bubblegum).  I have seen El Ligero a few times and he is pretty impressive but I had never seen Bubblegum before and wasn't sure how they would gel as a team but they were actually really good.  I love the team of Just Uz but, having seen them several times recently, some of their matches had seemed a little predictable, but this match was anything but!  In fact I would say this is probably the best match tag match I have seen in a very long time.  There were plenty of acrobatics from all four men, action inside and out of the ring and the match swung back and forth so much that I never knew what was coming and who was going to win.  Even the crowd was split with just as many chants for the challengers as there were for the champions.  This match also produced a "That Was Awesome" chant.  There were near falls for both teams and these guys gave absolutely everything they had - by the time Just Uz finally scored the win and retained their titles, there were four exhausted guys fighting just to stand upright!  It was really nice to see the champs show their appreciation for their opponents with them all hugging it out in the centre of the ring before the four stood in a line with hands raised!  A huge contender for Match of the Night but, after a lot of deliberating, I eventually decided to give this one joint runner up to that slot!

Next out to the ring were "Bad Boy" Liam Thomson and Kenny Williams, who I felt a little sorry for having to follow such an amazing match, but they did good!  Thomson came out to the ring first, without Carmel, which was probably lucky for me as I took my opportunity to wind him up once again about needing Carmel to save his ass!  Williams put on a good show against the solidly built Thomson, taking some brutal punishment but still managing to get some cracking shots of his own, almost scoring the pinfall, however it was Thomson who had the last laugh taking the win without needing the assistance of Carmel.

The first half main event matched Red Lightning against fan favourite Grado.  This was probably the weakest match on the card but was still entertaining.  Red Lighting came to the ring, got the microphone and started moaning about how the crowd didn't appreciate him....YAWN!  Out came Grado to a massive pop - everybody loves Grado.  Of course Lightning then complained he couldn't start the match until the smoke cleared because of his asthma!  The match had its usual comedy moments, Grado patting down referee Sri Hari and squeezing his butt, sitting on Red's back riding him like a pony and slapping his ass, having the ref help him up onto the top rope and after winning the match making the poor ref dance and attempt a cartwheel, however there was some actual wrestling, including a rather impressive leapfrog over Red Lighting, proving that Grado does actually have the agility required in the ring!  While this cannot be classed as an amazing display of wrestling, it was fun and entertaining and the crowd loved it!

The second half started with my other joint runner up for Match of the Night - the German wrestler Bad Bones against Joe Coffey.  This was the first time I have seen Bad Bones and I really hope that I get another opportunity to see him in the future.  The match was amazing.  Joe Coffey has been impressing me more and more each time I see him and these two guys were evenly matched in height and build.  I got so enthralled with this match that I didn't take anywhere near as many photos as I would normally.  The noise when these two guys collided with shoulder blocks was incredible.  There was a slugfest at the opposite side of the ring from where we were sitting and Bad Bones hit Joe so hard, his gum landed just a few feet from me!  Once again, we were treated to a match where both guys gave everything, leaving absolutely nothing in the tank.  There were several near falls where I didn't think either man would have the strength to kick out of.  This was a match that either man deserved to win, however it was Bad Bones who finished victorious, with Coffey taking a few minutes while Bad Bones celebrated to get his breath back before leaving ringside.

Next was due to be a battle of the "Take Me Out" stars "Party" Marty Scurll and Davey Blaze, however Marty Scurll had recently dislocated his shoulder and was unable to compete.  Instead he came out to the ring and started to insult the crowd.  This was when I got my one true insult of the night - after inviting him to kiss my ass, he replied "shut your mouth you old tart or I'll come out there and slap you!"  Of course I dared him to just try it!  After running his mouth about how wonderful he was and enduring a chant of "Rockstar Spud" after mentioning TNA British Bootcamp, he then mentioned Take Me Out and the fact that another wrestler had appeared on the show.  At this point Davey Blaze appeared, saying he was sick of Scurll running his mouth on twitter and that he was going to rip off his head and remove his spleen!  Scurll, hiding behind both the referee Eddie Roberts and ring announcer Simon Cassidy to stop Blaze from knocking his block off, then said he had paid someone to take his place in the match....enter James Scott.  After enduring a chant of "wee fat Taz", Scott then said Scurll had paid him a lot of money to break Blaze, however he offered Blaze the chance to shake his hand and leave the ring with his teeth still in his mouth.  Blaze declined his kind offer....and another great match was on.  James Scott took the upper hand early in the match and with the action spilling out of the ring, I braced my feet against the barriers as they slammed into them!  Scott then powerbombed Blaze on the outer edge of the ring - that had to really hurt.  Back in the ring Davey fought his way back into the match, which continued to swing back and forth with both men getting 2 counts until finally Blaze took the win.  A tough and brutal match which was probably better than the original match would have been, however I would still like to see Scurll v Blaze on a future show.

The final match of the night, the main event, was my pick for Match of the Night, the BCW Heavyweight Championship match between current champ, Kid Fite and Prince Fergal Devitt.  This was an absolutely phenomenal match.  Kid Fite entered the ring first to his usual chorus of boos.  Devitt's entrance was incredible!  The pic below was taken by official photographer David Wilson.

Devitt had his face and body painted up in a half Spiderman/half Spiderman 3000 design which looked amazing but during the course of the match smudged and smeared into a black mess which covered both the ring and Kid Fite.  At first Kid Fite jumped the rails and looked as though he would not take part in the fight, however he then returned to ringside with a chair which he hoped to use to nail Devitt.  His plan did not work and it was Kid Fite who ended up slammed onto the chair and the barriers and, as you will see from the photo below, that chair will never see it's intended use again!  This was another match where the guys gave their all.  There were moves I never thought possible and near pins for both wrestlers, however at the end of the night it was Kid Fite who stood on the turnbuckle with the belt....and a lot of Devitt's paintjob too.  My only complaint would be this match was too short - I wanted more - but then again, I don't think either of them could have given any more so I will just wait and hope that BCW will release a DVD of the event so I can watch it over and over again!

The Face-Off

Still Champ

Poor Chair!!

After the match I had the chance to speak to BCW owner Graham McKay and several of the wrestlers and tell them just how incredible I thought the night had been.  Rob got to meet Bad Bones and get his photo taken with him, however we were unable to meet Fergal Devitt as he was off getting cleaned up....we just hope that we have another chance to see and maybe meet the man himself soon.

For more of my photos from the event, check out The Blue-Haired Loudmouth page on Facebook

You can find more information about British Championship Wrestling on their Facebook page or their website