Category: Europe

A tournament with this much talent should end with that wonderful, happy adrenaline that great wrestling brings. Rev Pro’s British J Cup 2018 did not.

Neil David reviews Night 1 of Rev Pro’s British J Cup 2018.

Rev Pro Live at the Cockpit 32 was certainly a rollercoaster of a show that will unfortunately be lost amongst TV tapings and the J Cup in Manchester

With wXw you used to be able to get away with skimming and watching two weekends a year. Now every major event is killer; Fan Appreciation is no different.

I have no reservations about heralding Rev Pro as the best promotion in the UK and I’m happy to use Summer Sizzler 2018 as my evidence.

PROGRESS Wrestling Chapter 74 was not the best of shows from PROGRESS and they’ve been beset by misfortune again this summer.

Aside from the truly dismal main event, ICW Shugs Hoose Party 5 Night 2was another perfectly solid show from ICW.

While Fourth Shade of Green was a fairly consistent show there was nothing that cracked **** with the emphasis instead more on storylines.

If you enjoy Lucha Underground and are interested in seeing a product with a similar presentation; then you may want to check out Underworld Wrestling.

There were two great matches on Got Got Need. The rest of the show was patchy but any show with two great matches on it is fine by me.

If That Ring was the final ever Tivoli show then OTT left it with a bang. There were surprises. There was great comedy. There was world class wrestling.

At six matches in under three hours, Wrestle Queendom is a breeze to watch. The back half of the card is especially strong. More-so than even the match quality, there’s a really great atmosphere throughout the show. There’s several hiccups in the show but overall this was a great first step and very successful showing.

PROGRESS Wrestling Chapter 70 was a fantastic show from this young promotion in London. The wait to get this tape from my good friend was worth it as the future of pro wrestling seems bright.

A better ending to the main event and SSS16 Night 2 would have been one of the best PROGRESS shows in awhile. As is, this was still a very strong show with some excellent tournament matches.

Scotland’s leading wrestling promotion returned to the iconic Barrowlands Ballroom in Glasgow last weekend for their fourth-annual ICW Barramania show, headlined by BT Gunn defending the World Heavyweight Title against Mikey Whiplash in a Deathmatch.

There was a lot of good stuff on PROGRESS Chapter 65: Have Some Faith In The Sound, far more than I was expecting after relatively negative reviews from people who were there live.

At around 90 minutes, wXw We Love Wrestling Tour 2018: London was a breeze to watch. The tag match was great and the main event was awesome, possibly the best fourway I’ve ever seen.

The Turbinenhalle is not a church but it’s holy ground as wXw puts a bow on 16 Carat Gold 2018.

wXw 16 Carat Gold 2018 Night 2 was a genuine show of the year contender from wXw, with a main event that concluded one of the best long-term stories in European wrestling ever, plus two absolute bangers elsewhere in the show.

Night 1 of 16 Carat Gold 2018 was a very enjoyable show to watch from start to finish. While none of the bouts on the card stood out as being “out of this world” incredible, there wasn’t anything bad to speak of.

Homecoming was without a doubt the best top to bottom show OTT has ever produced. The show had it all. Top class wrestling, matches with stakes and consequences, unforgettable moments… The final four matches all being **** or higher tell you just how much I enjoyed this.

The Thunderbastard is always a fun match. This wasn’t one of the best incarnations of it but there was still a lot of strong storyline work in PROGRESS Wrestling Chapter 64 involving Eddie Dennis, Flash Morgan Webster and both TK Cooper and Chris Brookes.

A middling effort from ICW with Square Go! The constant apses back into their old bad booking habits are the lingering takeaway, but they are somewhat redeemed by the fun opening contest a solid tag team title bout and an enjoyable Square Go!

The middle of PROGRESS Chapter 63 was absolutely sensational. Sabre/Bate, WALTER/Davis and the BSS tag were all tremendous pro wrestling matches. All completely different too!

An incredibly mediocre show. Only a few things stood out here. The two tournaments both petered out and Apollo Crews, for all his press, clearly came over here to work at a house show level.

wXw Dead End XVII saw a lot of stories advance along with a really fun Tag Title match and a proper banger in the main event. wXw’s stories are peaking just at the right time ahead of 16 Carat, when the most eyes will be on them.

Definitely watch the main event of Road to Glory, it’s different class to everything else. The undercard isn’t particularly good. There’s a solid Allmark match, a trademark of PCW, and that’s about it.

I was mentally starting a write-up of Fear No More, before the main event, and it was regarding the booking and how improved it was on this show. I was ready to get excited about the direction, but at the same time suggest this wasn’t one of PROGRESS’ best in-ring outings. Then the main event changed everything.

Even if you’re not invested in the current storyline, wXw Back to the Roots XVII was still one of their better ‘marquee’ shows with the spectacle of the Käfigschlacht being the highlight.

High Stakes was a very good show bell-to-bell from RPW. Ospreay added another great contest to the slew he’s already had this year, Brooks’ debut couldn’t have gone much better. Then there was the main event. Words can’t really describe how much I enjoyed it, and it is a match every wrestling fan should watch.

Don’t Touch Me was a beautifully consistent show. Everything delivered. The stand-out match coming from Ospreay and Brooks but everyone should be proud of what they achieved here. Even the maligned Conners delivered, albeit in a match he shouldn’t fail in under any circumstances.

While I didn’t love everything on Being the Elite, there is more than enough good to make the less enjoyable moments worth sitting through. This night was all about Irish talent finally arriving and being taken seriously.

A good show from RPW. Overall it was a very easy to watch two hours. ZSJ/Stone and Dunne/Brookes are worth a watch if you’re interested but far from essential, as is the British Women’s Championship final.

A solid if unremarkable start to the year for RPW. The women’s championship tournament matches were all solid, with Purrazzo/Jayne particularly standing out. As for recommending matches, the only one I’d say is worth a watch is Dunne/Phantasmo. Here’s hoping Live at the Cockpit 25 delivers a little more.

Unboxing was a great show to the end the year from PROGRESS. I’m fired up for 2018. Banks against Ospreay was blow-away good.

This wasn’t perhaps the blowaway show we were expecting from the 17th Anniversary Show but two matches did really stand out: Bones-Dragunov and Starr-Simmons.

There was some really good wrestling on Chapter 59. Not one of PROGRESS’ best shows but the surprise last minute changes were handled extremely well.

Uprising was a thumbs in the middle show from RPW. Hopefully it’ll be onwards and upwards for RPW in 2018 – if you’re short on time check out ZSJ/Riddle.

Live Your Best Life was a weaker PROGRESS show for in-ring quality, but there were numerous positives to take away from the show nonetheless.

Buy this show. Watch Ospreay vs. Sabre. Watch it again. Then watch it a third time. I’ll definitely be coming back after this set of Global Wars UK shows.

Buy this show. Watch Ishii against Keith Lee. Watch it again. Then watch it a third time. Other than that, Scurll/Naito and the main are worth checking out.

wXw Broken Rules XVII was a story-heavy show that felt very rewarding after several weeks of Shotgun build.

Enter Smiling was a consistently good show, which is exactly what you’d expect from PROGRESS. As a promotion they put on consistently good shows.

Fear & Loathing was a thumbs in the middle show for ICW. The main event and King of Insanity match are definitely worth a watch.

wXw find another gear when they’re in London. They put on a great show in January and this Fight Forever show was the same. An absolute banger of a show.

Looking at the snowflakes you’d probably think La Danse Macabre was one of PROGRESS’ weaker shows this year but the truth is this was a delightful show.

If 16 Carat put wXw on the international map, the World Tag Team League marked that they are here to stay there.

All the World Tag Team League shows were good, especially as part of the bigger picture. It doesn’t look much from the stars but that’s not what wXw’s about

This was a good show to kick off the World Tag Team League proper. A4 and Massive Product had one of the best tags you’ll see anywhere this year.

This was a good consistent show from Lucha Forever. I enjoyed the variety on the show; there’s three really good matches on this show and they’re all different.

Revelations of Divine Love was about building characters, building brands and working towards a higher standard in the future, and it succeeded in that.

OTT returned to the Tivoli for WrasslePops following the highly successful WrassleRama show at the...

The good news is there’s absolutely nothing bad on this Ally Pally show. Nothing at all. The bad news is that the show tops out with the opener.

It took a few matches for RPW Live at the Cockpit 19 to really hit its stride, but the last two matches were a lot of fun

Fans Appreciation Night was a solid yet unspectacular offering from wXw that continued RISE’s dominance as they now hold all the gold in the promotion.

PROGRESS Chapter 54 was very much the lead in show for Alexandra Palace so the focus was on that show, not this one. It lacked any stand out matches.

Even though there is nothing must see on PROGRESS: Boston the show breezed by. If PROGRESS was to ever run a house show this is what it’d look like.

PROGRESS: New York will be remembered for TK Cooper’s horrific ankle injury, but on the bright side it contained yet another great WALTER-Riddle match.

WrestleRama has to be considered a major success. I’d highly recommend to anybody who wants a feel of what OTT’s all about.

The WCPW Pro Wrestling World Cup Final show was okay. The World Cup content delivered, but the non-tournament stuff dragged the show down.

WCPW Stacked 2017 was a fine show, which is where WCPW seems to top out these days.

Time is a valuable commodity, and the Pro Wrestling World Cup Quarter Final show made very poor use of it. Ospreay-Bailey was very good though.

Overall the Round of 16 in the Pro Wrestling World Cup was a strong show, that was one outstanding match away from being great.

Revolution Pro Wrestling’s Summer Sizzler 2017 is one of the better BritWres shows of the year so far.

What Culture went up to Newcastle for their last World Cup qualifier, which will see the fifteenth...

Only the very top promotions manage to achieve an emotional connection. PROGRESS did it twice with the South Pacific Power Couple return and the Riots split

Three great matches of Vote Pies and a consistent level for the rest make it hard to argue with PROGRESS being the flag-bearer for BritWres right now.

The American leg of WCPW’s World Cup ended up being a good show with a really strong second half. For my money the best World Cup offering yet.

RPW’s Live at the Cockpit 18 was a more complete show than last month and despite no standout match, there’s plenty of stuff here that’s worth your time.

I think a lot of peoples enjoyment of Screaming for Progress will come down to how they feel about the main event. For me this show was can’t miss.

The Japan Pro Wrestling World Cup was a consistent show but lacked a great match to put it over the top; I will remember little from it come a months time.

There was some good stuff on this World Cup show, with some of the GWF guys impressing, but as an overall package it wasn’t a particularly good show.

Born to be Wasted was OTT’s weakest show of the year from an in ring perspective but there were some key developments on the road to WrestleRama.

Shortcut to the Top was a solid show to finish off wXw’s We Love Wrestling tour, including a fantastic match between Al-Ani and Riddle.

RPW’s British J Cup was a show that was greater than the sum of its parts, thanks to a Liger-focussed tournament story that paid off in a very feel-good way

Dijak and Dunne was the highlight of PROGRESS Chapter 50’s undercard, but the show was all about the excellent main event between BSS and #CCK.

There were several matches on Built to Destroy that I would recommend to watch, but the last 45 minutes of this show were a goddamn dumpster fire.

There were no blow-away matches on this show, but the Cockpit remains remarkably consistent and fun in its execution of simple long-term storytelling

Top to bottom Outer Space Odyssey III was the best OTT show ever. It had a little bit of everything, and it was all great.

The Canadian leg was comfortably the best of the four Pro Wrestling World Cup shows so far, highlighted by a tremendous Bailey vs. O’Reilly match.

I loved all three nights of Super Strong Style for different reasons but this was the night I felt was special. Travis Banks’ crowning moment was glorious.

Kidd vs. Gibson was the runaway match of the night on Fight Back. Everything else was average at best and not really worth your time.

This was a fun show with a must see match between Cobb and Riddle and a historic main event deciding the destination of the PROGRESS Womens Championship.

A very solid start to the Super Strong Style 16 tournament with four very good matches and a shock main event that worked well within the 3-day structure.

Not a good show Wrestling World Cup show. A handful of good matches mixed in with a handful of forgettable ones and an uncomfortable situation in the main.

Revolution Pro Wrestling Live at the Cockpit shows have been very rewarding to follow this year.

HendryMania was not a show worth seeking out. If you want to watch a WCPW show, save your money and watch one of their recent free YouTube offerings.

Superstars of Wrestling was a show of high highs and low lows. The top end was excellent with the spotty main event in particular being tremendous fun.