REVIEW: United Wrestling UK - Day 4, Heart Beating
Credit: United Wrestling UK
United Wrestling UK: Day 4, Heart Beating
Saturday, February 12, 2022
St Gregs School, Oxford
Reviewer: Dave Sewell (@davesewell04)
Well it was off to St Gregory The Great’s School in Oxford for this one. I had been to the Purpose show the night before and after finally going to bed at 12:45am, I got up at 4:30am for the half day of work I’d booked.
I left at 9:30, got home at 10:00, showered, shaved and changed and got my bag ready and got in the car to set off for Oxford about 11 - it’s fair to say I was a bit tired.
The Sat Nav sent me to the wrong road but I did eventually find the venue. I had two and a half hours to kill before show time so I decided to find a cafe and settle down.
Show time entered and upon entering the school there was a large sports hall on the left, which I thought the show would be in, but it turns out there was another hall on the other side of the school where they do plays - good thing I checked.
We were told by the MC, didn’t quite catch his name, that due to medical reasons Chakara wasn’t cleared to wrestle LA Taylor (get well soon Chakara). He added that Taylor would still have a match against a new opponent and the winner would get a shot at Mariah May’s United Wrestling Championship - or whoever should hold it at the end of the night…
A young lady at the back of the room was bestowed the honour or ringing the match bell, but more on that later…
Just Joe Lando vs CJ Carter
Credit: United Wrestling UK
This was a contest between. two wrestlers I’d never seen before and was very much looking forward to. Carter, the heel in this match, told me to shut up - but to be fair I had told him he sucked.
This was a pretty good, fast paced, match with some great chemistry between the two. Some vicious moves were dished out by CJ - a backstabber off the ropes comes to mind. This coupled with Joe’s high flying moves, like a great shooting star press, made for a great match.
CJ won the match with a Claymore followed by a Death Valley Driver.
Sunset Skip vs Josh Nomax
Credit: United Wrestling UK
Skip was not happy that the crowd apparently did not know how to properly applaud for him and as he had to teach us he would not be defending his Pan-Arabian Championship.
His opponent was the masked Josh Nomax. The story of the match was Skip being experienced in the art of graps and talking all the way through the match, explaining to us what was going on. He went into detail about what Josh should be doing, what he was going to do, etc.
One bloke shouted out “why don’t you just shut up and wrestle”, I like to think he spoke for everyone. In the end the ref was distracted so Skip took off the turnbuckle pad and ran Josh’s head into it. This was inevitably reversed, setting up a dazed Skip to be pinned following a flying crossbody, much to his bewilderment.
However, I guess Skip did still walk out as the Pan-Arabian champion.
Wrestling Memes vs Jordan Sparks
We then had an appearance by Wrestling Memes who was promised a match on this show but hadn’t been given a specific opponent, so decided to issue an open challenge.
He then went back behind the curtain, telling us to pretend he hadn’t come out and to give him a big cheer - which happened.
The guy who turned out to be his opponent, Jordan Sparks. Memes was a bit of a goofy, lovable guy in this one. It was a fun comedy match up with both guys hamming it up to the max. There were compliments dished out left and right.
Jordan’s “oh I give up….no I don’t” groans were quite funny. The end came when Memes’ true colours came through when both stopped short of squashing the ref in the corner.
Memes hit a mule kick right in the family jewels or Sparks, setting up a cutter and the ropes hung pedigree.
Two Good Eggs (Rex Armstrong and JJ Lynch) vs The '87 (Roy Johnson and Alexander Roth)
Credit: United Wrestling UK
In the second half it was I who was given the responsibility of the ring bell. My first duty was to start the match between the Two Good Eggs and The 87.
This was the first time I’ve seen The 87 as heels and they are quite good at it. These two teams were always going to have a good match, Rex in particular has improved so much post-Pandemic.
The first third of the match belonged to The Eggs, before The 87 rallied and came back into the contest in the second half.
There was a Johnson and Roth stampede on Lynch before Rex got into a brawl on the outside of the ring with Big Wavy.
Tags were made and the match swung back and forth with several close calls. The Eggs picked up the win with a double submission which led to some confusion. Remember how I said I was in charge of the ring bell? Well I saw the tap and rung the bell, but not hard enough as the wrestlers didn’t hear it.
In the end the cameraman spared my blushes and managed to strike it the right way. I really could’ve died at this point.
LA Taylor vs Echo Reed vs Mariah May - United Wrestling Championship
Credit: United Wrestling UK
The main event did see LA Taylor in action, but not in a number one contender’s match. Instead she was inserted into the title picture making the match Taylor vs Echo Reed vs Mariah May.
The match didn’t start well for the Champion Princess as she managed to get on the wrong side of both of her opponents and despite her best efforts to sweet talk her way out of it she ended up with them taking turns hitting her before one simultaneous put down.
The dynamics of this match worked really well: the speed of Echo, the power of LA and the cunning of Mariah, who looked to pick her spots which sometimes ended up costing her.
She hit Reed with a big German suplex, Reed then tried the same on Taylor who turned it into an airplane spin. The strength of LA was very impressive to witness, she later slammed Echo onto May.
The end came in a flurry of activity. It started when Taylor hit Reed with a huge pop-up powerbomb. Mariah pulled the ref out of the ring just before the three and LA went after Mariah in a rage.
May ran Taylor into the ring post then got back in the ring and found herself on the wrong end of a small package from Reed, which she managed to kick out of.
Reed then went behind May to push her into the ropes for another roll up but the champ ducked through the middle rope, causing Echo to hit her throat on the top rope.
Mariah grabbed her belt. “You can’t do that,” said the ref. “I’ll do whatever I want sweetie,” she answered back. The bashed Echo with the belt for the three count and retained the title. I made sure to give the bell a good ring this time.
After the match CJ and Memes came out onto the mic. CJ said he was undefeated and will win the belt from May. Memes had the mic next before Josh Nomax came out. May bashes his head into the corner as the rest of the locker room comes out to brawl.
May escapes with her belt and leaves them to it.
I quite enjoyed this show. The crowd were quite quiet so it felt a bit like a holiday camp show. I would definitely go again but I’d leave later to make sure I wasn’t hanging around for too long.
I did find out that being a timekeeper isn’t all that easy, especially if you get too invested in the matches as I did.