Wrestling Chatter

Hi guys, Well, hasn't it been a crazy few weeks for wrestling. The Coronavirus stopped a lot of Japanese shows, Goldberg became the WWE Universal Champion and then was challenged by Roman Reigns, Chris Brookes wants to make Antonio Honda bleed and DDT's MAO wore shorts for the first time in what seemed like forever. I also had my first attempt at ring announcing and didn't completely make a fool of myself. Yet, in the midst of all that, I thought it was about time to get another list out. If any of you listened to my podcast last week then this will make sense, if you didn't then make sure to go and listen to it now (or after you've read this post). Basically, I spoke about the whole concept of being a heel and whether it's plausible or not in this day and age. My conclusion was pretty inconclusive but I think that wrestling isn't black or white. However, despite that, heels are a must in wrestling and I thought I'd have a look and see who my to...

Hi guys, Today is Valentine's Day if any of you didn't notice from all those soppy Facebook posts, shop displays and adverts on the television. For those of you who didn't guess, I'm single again this year but I'm not bitter - nope. So, instead of moping in my usual way, I thought I’d write a more light hearted post for all you today! I delved into the world of my favourite wrestlers and had to pick only 10 for this list. It's the wrestlers who are so adorable and make my lack of a relationship seem less heartbreaking *cue audience sympathy*. Because I don’t have a special guy in my life, I thought I’d write about the only guys who matter and that’s all my special wrestling boys who always make me smile. I mean who needs a boyfriend anyway... not me! Just a note, this post is no way meant to be serious, demeaning and in anyway objectifying any of the male wrestlers on this list because I really respect as both people and athletes, it's just for a ...

Hi guys, HAPPY NEW YEAR! I can't believe it's already 2020 and 2019 seems like a distant memory... But, what a 2019 it has been? Never mind what a year it's been in professional wrestling. It seems as if I've been spending more of this year watching wrestling and writing about it than anything else. Because of this, it almost seems impossible for me to write about a year in wrestling because I wouldn't even know where to start. Even if I just looked at one promotion, for example my fave New Japan, there could be a post per month which is crazy. So, I thought that the best thing to do would be to look at all the promotions I watch and pick my MVP wrestlers of the year. I'm taking on board a lot of different things when making these choices including level of improvement, how much I've enjoyed watching them and obviously how well they've done in matches this year. However, I've given myself a near impossible task by only picking 5 and I ca...

Hi Guys, The last few weeks have been crazy in the world of wrestling from NJPW to AEW to WWE to all the independent promotions we all love to watch. This weekend was no exception with not only NXT Takeover: War Games, but also Survivor Series. Also, for the first time, there were matches not only between the red and blue brand, but also WWE's black and gold brand: RAW v Smackdown Live v NXT. On Saturday night, NXT once again put on an amazing set of matches showcasing some of the best and most diverse athletes in the entire industry and every match turned out. We had an amazing triple threat match between Pete Dunne, Damian Priest and Killian Dane mixing strong style and crazy athletics as well as an amazingly brutal singles match between Finn Balor and Matt Riddle. As expected the main war games match between Undisputed Era and the dream team of Tomasso Ciampa, Kevin Owens, Keith Lee and Dijakovic was phenomenal. However, my stand out match of the night was the women...

Hi guys, Hasn't the world of professional wrestling been crazy over the last few days. A few months ago, I wrote an article about the resurgence of British wrestling ( http://www.mancunianmatters.co.uk/content/040778118-analysis-resurgence-british-wrestling ) but nowadays it seems as if I can't wake up without seeing a 'British wrestling is dead' tweet somewhere - crazy right? It's all stemmed from some rumours centring WWE UK and the sudden closure of Defiant Wrestling. In my opinion, the only thing that's dead is Tuesday Night Graps but that's being sorted now so it's fine with SCHADENFREUDE. I've voiced my concerns when the promotion started in terms of what it could do to the independent scene and we saw from the word go that WWE started monopolising on the industry in a pretty devious and toxic way. We've had so many wrestlers from BSS, Grizzled Young Vets, Viper and Kay Lee Ray being signed to exclusive contracts, Jim Smallman ...

Hi guys, After a week (in which I started my new intensive journalism course), I'm back for a preview of the New Japan Cup which is always exciting and really full on with the schedule! Like all the other tournaments, I'm going to run down all the participants who've been announced and the possible match ups that I'm mega looking forward too! With all the guys chasing Jay White for his title, the stakes are massive! I was initially going to do the usual ‘look at each competitor’ thing, but the card's so stacked and there’s 24 competitors. So I’ve decided to look at them in terms of first matches. They changed it up this year by putting most of the heavyweights which is nice! Also, I’ll split this preview into two posts because there’s so much to write about - I don’t want to blow your mind. Hope you enjoy! Yuji Nagata v Tomohiro Ishii When this match was announced, I was literally over the moon considering what happened at Iizka's retirement show. Both...

Hi guys, First of all, Merry Christmas. Secondly, what a year 2018 has been for wrestling - there's been ups and downs but in the end of it, without wrestling, my life would've been very different. Wrestling really isn't what it is without the wrestlers themselves and there's been some right stand outs this year so here's my list of MVP's who have really stood out for me in a business that's full of so much talent! 1. Jay White Me and this blog have made no secret of the fact that Jay White is probably my favourite wrestler but it's not just my bias that's put him no.1 on this list - he's had a hell of a 2018! After coming back from excursion and losing his match against Tanahashi for the IC belt, he got back on course by joining Chaos and then beating Kenny Omega for the US title on the 28th January which he had great defences with against likes of Hangman Page and David Finlay. Even after losing the title, with the likes of the G1 wins ...