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143-445: The British Heavy Middleweight Championship was a top British wrestling championship found throughout the country's circuit. The title's history dates back to its foundation by Joint Promotions in 1953. Officially heavy middleweights were required to weight between 12 st 8 lb (176 lbs) and 13 st 5 lb (187 lb) . The championship was recognised and defended on matches screened by UK national television network ITV as part of
286-842: A cliffhanger and consequently, All Star underwent a box office boom as hardcore fans turned up to live shows to see what happened next, and kept coming for several years due to careful use of show-to-show storylines. Headline matches frequently pitted Nagasaki in violent heel vs heel battles against the likes of Rocco, Dave 'Fit' Finlay , Skull Murphy (Peter Northey) and even Giant Haystacks , or at smaller venues teaming with regular partner "Blondie" Bob Barrett to usually defeat blue-eye opposition. Many British wrestlers also continued to appear on television, alongside French, German and other talent, via France's TV show New Catch which originally debuted on French terrestrial channel TF1 in 1988 before being transplanted to satellite channel Eurosport upon its early 1989 launch, where it would continue into
429-478: A four-way match , involving Tanahashi, Moxley and Juice Robinson , but failed to win the championship after being pinned by Robinson. Ospreay, along with Sanada, was set to get another title shot, at Dominion 6.12 in Osaka-jo Hall on 12 June in a Three-way match ; however, when Robinson had to vacate the championship due to his appendicitis , Ospreay faced Sanada one-on-one for the vacant championship, where he
572-467: A "gymnastics routine". Ospreay won his block in the tournament with a record of four wins and three losses, advancing to the finals. On 7 June, Ospreay defeated Ryusuke Taguchi in the finals to win the 2016 Best of the Super Juniors, becoming the youngest winner in the history of the tournament as well as the first English and the fifth gaijin wrestler to win tournament. Following the win, Ospreay
715-447: A Winner takes all match at G1 Supercard . At the event, Ospreay lost the match, in the process losing his title to Cobb, who retained his title. Ospreay participated in the 2019 edition of Best of the Super Juniors , where he won his block with a record of 7–2, advancing to the final. In the preliminary rounds, he suffered losses against long-time rivals Robbie Eagles and El Phantasmo . On 5 June Ospreay defeated Shingo Takagi to win
858-456: A challenge which Ospreay accepted. Ospreay lost the championship to Omega at Wrestle Kingdom, ending his reign at 206 days. Ospreay attempted to rebound following another loss at Wrestle Kingdom, by entering the 2023 New Japan Cup , in March. Ospreay received a bye to the second round, where he defeated United Empire stablemate Mark Davis to advance to the quarterfinals. However, soon after it
1001-536: A co-promoted show with Combat Zone Wrestling in October, he won it a fortnight later in a Six-Way Elimination match. He defended it over the following months to many SWE and guest wrestlers, eventually putting it on the line in the annual Speed King Tournament where he beat Mark Andrews in the semi-final in a Best of Three falls match but lost the title to El Ligero in a Six-Way Elimination match on 30 May 2015. The following March he unsuccessfully challenged Joseph Connors for
1144-471: A consortium of independent promoters under the British Wrestling Federation (BWF) whose name was used for a rival championship, built around Heavyweight champion Bert Assirati who split away from Joint Promotions in 1958 while still champion. Although Joint Promotions considered the title vacant and held a tournament for a new champion (won by Billy Joyce), Assirati continued to claim it within
1287-596: A contract signing ceremony on Derek Davis ' Davis at Large show. Later in the 1980s and 1990s, transmissions of Williams' Reslo programme on S4C could be received in much of the southern and eastern Republic of Ireland and Williams organised several tours of Ireland with his show's roster during this time. In the 21st century, the dominant promotion in Ireland had been Irish Whip Wrestling before being replaced in popularity by Over The Top Wrestling . Will Ospreay William Peter Charles Ospreay (born 7 May 1993)
1430-478: A crowd of around 80,000. Following the demise of Joint Promotions and the slowdown at All Star, several of British wrestling's old mainstay attractions chose to retire, while many younger stars such as Steve Regal and Dave Taylor as well as veterans like Finlay and Haystacks emigrated to the United States to continue their careers. Nevertheless, several Independent promoters attempted to capture what remained of
1573-577: A direct revival of the old slot on the World Of Sport programme) was filmed at the Fairfield Halls , Croydon in 2013, however it was not picked up by ITV. Another attempt was given an airing by ITV on New Year's Eve 2016. A follow-up series of 10 episodes was due to be filmed at Preston Guild Hall in May 2017 but this was postponed until a year later. Around this time, WWE also took an active interest in
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#17328590372821716-495: A disqualification, "knockouts" (countouts) and disqualifications counting as automatic two falls in best of three falls matches (which were predominant), and no follow-up moves allowed on a grounded opponent. Similar rule systems were adopted by most major promotions in mainland Western Europe (although French wrestling abandoned rounds early on.) The existence of the committee was readily acknowledged by promoters who used its existence to counter any accusations of wrongdoings within
1859-647: A four-way ladder match to become WCPW Tag Team Champions. They lost the title to War Machine on an episode of Loaded. In August 2017, Ospreay made it to the finals of the Pro Wrestling World Cup, before losing to Kushida. On 4 January 2017, Ospreay, along with fellow British wrestler Ryan Smile, started their own promotion, known as Lucha Forever, with their first show, The Dawning of Forever, taking place on 17 April in Birmingham. Ospreay debuted for Revolution Pro Wrestling (RevPro) on 10 February 2013 with
2002-438: A knife and threatened to torture Ospreay, blaming it on Ospreay's popularity with the fans, before other wrestlers came out and intervened, freeing Ospreay. Havoc and The London Riots formed an allegiance known as Regression, which also featured Robinson. On 27 July, Ospreay entered the eight-man, staggered entry elimination Thunderbastard match, the winner of whom can pick a time for a Progress Championship match. Ospreay entered
2145-551: A larger-than-life fan favourite of children and pensioners alike. That he was no longer a bodybuilder youth, rather an overweight man in his forties, did not seem to be an obstacle as every major heel in the country was defeated by Daddy. This was usually in short order with Daddy gaining quick wins in his few singles matches and cleaning up quickly when tagged into his more frequent tag matches. Disgruntled contemporaries such as Adrian Street have attributed this to Shirley's lack of conditioning, although Max in response insisted that this
2288-638: A legitimate sport. Professional wrestling entered the mainstream British culture when the newly-formed independent television network ITV began broadcasting it in 1955, firstly on Saturday afternoons and then also in a late-night midweek slot. Domestically produced professional wrestling was at its peak of popularity when the television show World of Sport was launched in the mid-1960s, making household names out of Adrian Street , Mick McManus , Giant Haystacks , Jackie Pallo , Big Daddy , Mark Rocco , Steve Veidor , Dynamite Kid , and Kendo Nagasaki . An upmarket rebrand of ITV's sports coverage, alongside
2431-634: A loss to The London Riots (James Davis and Rob Lynch). His performance earned him a place in the Natural Progression Series I tournament, aimed at scouting and showcasing new wrestlers. He lost in the first round to eventual winner Mark Andrews in November and again in a rematch the following May. Andrews who, as part of his reward for winning, picked Ospreay to enter the following Natural Progression Series tournament. The two met again in January 2014 in
2574-579: A no disqualification match where the reinstated London Riots neutralised the threat of Robinson's interference and Ospreay ended Havoc's 609 day reign to become Progress Champion. Ospreay successfully defended his title against the 2015 Thunderbastard Haskins and then Robinson. Robinson attacked Ospreay after losing to him, but Ospreay was saved by a returning Mark Andrews. Ospreay went on to finally beat Andrews to defend his title. Ospreay also headlined Progress' first main show outside of London in Manchester, in
2717-642: A no disqualification, 2 out of 3 falls match with former tag team partner Paul Robinson as referee. At Chapter 82: Unboxing Live, Ospreay and Paul Robinson defeated Aussie Open ( Kyle Fletcher & Mark Davis ) to become the Progress Tag Team Champions. On 17 May 2023, it would be announced that Ospreay would return to Progress as part of the 2023 Super Strong Style 16 tournament. Ospreay's first match back would be against Tate Mayfairs, which he would win. His second match would be against Nathan Cruz, where he would lose by DQ and thus be eliminated from
2860-650: A number of title defences, Ospreay lost the title back to Bodom on 5 September 2015. Ospreay bounced back with wins over P. J. Black , René Duprée , and Ricochet, which put him in line for a three-way match for AJ Styles ' British Heavyweight Championship , which also featured Marty Scurll , where the champion retained. The following day, on 3 October 2015 he lost to New Japan Pro-Wrestling 's Kazuchika Okada . Okada, impressed with Ospreay, went on to recommend him to NJPW officials. This, along with endorsements from AJ Styles and Hiroshi Tanahashi , eventually led to Ospreay being signed by NJPW. In 2016 Ospreay beat Scurll and
3003-490: A promo declaring himself as the true IWGP World Heavyweight Champion due to him never being beaten for the title and revealed a separate and identical belt. He also claimed recognized IWGP World Heavyweight Champion Shingo Takagi to be an "Interim champion" as well as revealing himself out of the G1 Climax 31 . He also said he would be competing on New Japan's American show Strong . In the build-up to Wrestle Kingdom 16 , it
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#17328590372823146-487: A promotional business did not return to Britain until the beginning of the 1930s when the success of the more worked aspects of professional wrestling in America, like gimmickry and showmanship, were introduced to British wrestling. It was with this revival that the more submission -based Catch As Catch Can wrestling style, which had already replaced Greco Roman wrestling as the dominant style of professional wrestling in
3289-499: A public company whose staff had little experience of the unique business. Finally, promotions were left in the hands of Max Crabtree , the brother of Shirley , who was headhunted by Joint as the most experienced booker still in the business. Crabtree produced the next boom in British wrestling by creating the legend of Big Daddy , the alter ego of Shirley, who had been unemployed for the best part of 6 years before joining Joint in 1972 as
3432-402: A relationship with NJPW which Ospreay later confirmed. In August 2017, Ospreay made his debut appearance for Pro Wrestling Australia (PWA) at their Sydney event Call to Arms . Originally scheduled to face PWA Heavyweight Champion Robbie Eagles in a non-title match for the main event, Eagles made the last-minute decision to put his title on the line. Ospreay ultimately defeated Eagles and won
3575-513: A rematch from Wrestle Kingdom . Between the second and the thirds round, he suffered a legit injury that almost made him unable to participate further in the G1 Climax, but nevertheless, he managed to get cleared in a very short amount of time. Afterwards, Ospreay faced the leader of Chaos, Kazuchika Okada in the main events of Night 7 of the G1 Climax, yet lost in another well-received match. On 4 January 2020, at Wrestle Kingdom 14 , Ospreay lost
3718-625: A series of shows across 2016 for What Culture Pro Wrestling for both their weekly YouTube broadcast and iPPV shows, scoring wins over Noam Dar , Marty Scurll and feud with Martin Kirby. On WCPW Loaded #15 Ospreay defeated Martin Kirby with help from Adam Pacitti , Paul Robinson & Scott Wainwright, joining the Pacitti Club. At WCPW True Destiny, Ospreay teamed with Scotty Wainwright and defeated El Ligero & Gabriel Kidd and Johnny Moss & Liam Slater and Prospect (Alex Gracie & Lucas Archer) in
3861-489: A series of wins became the first FPW Tag Team Champions after winning a four-way match. They held the titles for nine months and eventually became embroiled in a Best of Four match series against both The London Riots and The Alpha Males (Iestyn Rees & Charlie Garrett) for the FPW Tag Team Championship. The Swords of Essex failed to win a match in the series, with Ospreay wrestling the final match, which also had
4004-595: A speaking tour of the United Kingdom , offered Ospreay an Evolve contract on behalf of Gabe Sapolsky while clarifying that the contract would not affect his NJPW deal. On 20 July, Pro Wrestling Torch reported Ospreay had signed the contract to make Evolve his American home promotion, but the Wrestling Observer Newsletter disputed this, reporting Ospreay did not sign and was still in talks with Evolve, PWG, TNA, and ROH, another American promotion who had
4147-529: A strong foothold in British Wrestling, dominated by Orig Williams from the mid/late 1960s onward up to the 21st century. Williams' British Wrestling Federation produced Welsh-language television wrestling programmes for the bilingual S4C channel in the 1980s and 1990s under the title Reslo . One compilation from the early 1990s was released on VHS (in English) as Wrestling Madness . As with old ITV footage on
4290-581: A tag team match between Chaos and Suzuki-gun . After the match, Ospreay challenged Sabre Jr. to another match for the title which was scheduled at RevPro's High Stakes event. At the event, Ospreay defeated Sabre Jr. to win the British Heavyweight Championship. After the match, Ospreay announced that he will be moving to the heavyweight division. Ospreay was supposed to be part of the 2020 New Japan Cup starting on 4 March; however, NJPW suspended all of its activities in late February due to
4433-561: A three-time IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion and the winner of the 2016 and 2019 Best of the Super Juniors . In 2019, Ospreay also won the NEVER Openweight Championship . That same year, Ospreay participated in the G1 Climax , NJPW's biggest tournament featuring heavyweight wrestlers. In 2020, he made his transition to the heavyweight division, where he won the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship . He
British Heavy Middleweight Championship - Misplaced Pages Continue
4576-489: A title vs title match to unify Ospreay's Undisputed British Heavyweight Championship and Knight Jr's British Heavyweight Championship. Ospreay made his final title defence of the year, defeating Shota Umino at RevPro Uprising 2021. Ospreay made his first title defence of 2022, defeating Michael Oku at RevPro High Stakes 2022, in a critically acclaimed match. His next title defence was against Mike Bailey on night 1 of RevPro's 10th Anniversary show on 20 August. On Night 2
4719-407: A tournament to crown a new IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion, due to Takahashi getting a neck injury and forcing him to vacate the belt, and lost against Marty Scurll. At King of Pro-Wrestling (2018) , Ospreay teamed with Hirooki Goto and Tomohiro Ishii in a winning effort against Suzuki-gun, represented by Minoru Suzuki, Takashi Iizuka and NEVER Openweight Champion Taichi. Ospreay pinned Taichi for
4862-565: A triple threat match against Zack Gibson and Morgan Webster to close out 2015. He lost the championship on 24 January 2016 to Marty Scurll when the referee stopped the match as Ospreay had passed out while being handcuffed in Scurll's chickenwing submission. Ospreay lost a rematch with Scurll at WrestleCon Supershow in Texas, USA in April and also lost a contendership match against Haskins on 31 July. He spent
5005-688: A win over Mike Hitchman. He soon started appearing in tag matches with Paul Robinson as The Swords of Essex and, after earning contendership with a win over The London Riots, won the British Tag Team Championship on 15 June 2013 during RevPro's first show at York Hall by defeating Project Ego (Kris Travis and Martin Kirby). After losing to Ricochet in a singles match, The Swords of Essex lost their British Tag Team Championship to Ricochet and his partner Rich Swann , The Inner City Machine Gun on 15 March 2014. On 19 October, Ospreay beat Josh Bodom for
5148-544: Is a former ROH World Television Champion , as well as independent promotions like Pro Wrestling Guerrilla (PWG). After making appearances in AEW in 2022 and 2023, he signed with the company and officially joined its roster after his NJPW contract expired in February 2024. Ospreay holds the record for the most 5 or more stars matches given by wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer with a total of 43 matches. William Peter Charles Ospreay
5291-500: Is a former and longest reigning Undisputed British Heavyweight Champion . He also wrestled for British promotion Progress Wrestling , where he is a former Progress World Champion . Ospreay began his career on the UK independent circuit in 2012. In 2016, after being recommended by AJ Styles , he began to work with the Japanese promotion NJPW as part of the junior heavyweight division, becoming
5434-471: Is an English professional wrestler . As of November 2023 , he is signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW), where he is a former two-time AEW International Champion . He is also known for his eight year tenure with New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), where he held various championships, including the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship . Ospreay previously wrestled for NJPW's United Kingdom -based partner promotion Revolution Pro Wrestling (RevPro), where he
5577-701: The COVID-19 pandemic . Although the company eventually resumed its activities with the New Japan Cup in June, travel limitations due to the pandemic have prevented most foreign wrestlers from returning to Japan. Ospreay made his return in September, where Ospreay participated in his second G1 Climax in the A Block where he ended his G1 run with twelve points. At night 17 of the G1 Climax, Ospreay defeated Kazuchika Okada after interference from Ospreay's girlfriend Bea Priestley and
5720-610: The Edwardian era , the first catch-as-catch-can based scene began in the 1930s, when it was popularised under the concept of " All-in Wrestling ", which emphasised an "anything goes" style and presentation. Following World War II, the style and presentation of professional wrestling in the UK underwent a dramatic shift, as the Admiral-Lord Mountevans rules were introduced to make British professional wrestling appear much closer to
5863-755: The European Greco-Roman Heavyweight Championship . This win gave Hackenschmidt a credible claim to the world title, cemented in 1905 with a win over American Heavyweight Champion Tom Jenkins in the United States . Hackenschmidt took a series of bookings in Manchester for a then impressive £150 a week. Noting Hackenschmidt's legitimately dominant style of wrestling threatened to kill crowd interest, Cochran persuaded Hackenschmidt to learn showmanship from Cannon and wrestle many of his matches for entertainment rather than sport; this displayed
British Heavy Middleweight Championship - Misplaced Pages Continue
6006-508: The NEVER Openweight 6-Man Tag Team Championship , but he and his Chaos stablemates Beretta and Rocky Romero were defeated by the defending champions, David Finlay, Ricochet and Satoshi Kojima . On 11 February 2017 at The New Beginning in Osaka , Ospreay unsuccessfully challenged Katsuyori Shibata for the British Heavyweight Championship. In May, Ospreay won his block in the 2017 Best of
6149-619: The WWE Championship and in 2022, McIntyre headlined WWE Clash at the Castle , which took place in front of 62,296 paid attendees in Cardiff, Wales. The next year saw All Elite Wrestling hold AEW All In 2023 in Wembley Stadium , London, England before 72,265 paid attendees. Excluding SummerSlam 1992, these were the largest professional wrestling events to ever be held in the UK. Wales had
6292-652: The "southern Area" titles actually being fought for. The Empire/Commonwealth titles were a "long stop" title, being used by promotions outside of the Joint monopoly, for the most part. But while titles had some success, it was television that took British wrestling to the next level. The first show aired on ABC and ATV (the weekend franchise holders on ITV ) on 9 November 1955, featuring Francis St Clair Gregory (9 times Cornish wrestling heavyweight title holder and father of Tony St Clair ) versus Mike Marino and Cliff Beaumont versus Bert Royal live from West Ham baths. The show
6435-552: The 1960s, World Lightweight champion George Kidd was a successful television broadcaster, hosting his own chat show in Scotland's ITV regions. The dominant promoter in Northern Ireland in the 1960s/1970s was former Irish national Olympic coach David "Fit" Finlay Senior who promoted wrestling on both sides of the border and trained such stars as his son Dave Finlay , Eddie Hammill and Sean "Rasputin" Doyle. Due to The Troubles , in
6578-519: The 1970s and 1980s these wrestlers and others would migrate to mainland Britain and find success there (in Hamill's case, under a mask, billed as Kung Fu.) The younger Finlay would become a multiple champion and later succeed in America. Although RTÉ never had a wrestling show of its own, in the mid-1980s, a major championship match between Mighty John Quinn and Haystacks in Claremorris was publicised with
6721-488: The 2018 Best of the Super Juniors, finishing the tournament with 5 wins and 2 losses, but didn't advance to the finals due to his loss against Ishimori on the first day of the tournament. Ospreay lost the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship to the winner of the tournament, Hiromu Takahashi at Dominion 6.9 in Osaka-jo Hall on 9 June in his fourth defense. At Fighting Spirit Unleashed , Ospreay entered
6864-496: The American variant. Features such as timed rounds and multiple falls were dropped in favour of American "one fall to a finish" matches. Conditions in the British scene would remain at a low ebb (with some smaller promoters resorting to "WWF tribute " shows ) until the early-2000s, when a new generation of domestic stars would emerge, amongst them Doug Williams and Nigel McGuinness , who would split their time between performing in
7007-516: The BWF. The group later built itself around a new champion in Shirley Crabtree , a young bodybuilder who won the title after it was vacated by Assirati while injured in 1960. The BWF faded away in the late 1960s after a campaign by a disgruntled Assirati (vastly superior as a shooter to Crabtree) in the form of unsolicited appearances and challenges to his successor at BWF shows, eventually resulting in
7150-523: The British Cruiserweight Championship in a match that also included Swann. The day before, he had lost a match to Matt Sydal and so in May 2015 the two had a rematch. Although Ospreay won the rematch, with their series at 1–1 the two were booked in a Best of Three Falls match with the British Cruiserweight Championship on the line. After losing the first fall, he retained the title with two straight falls. After an eleven-month reign, with
7293-594: The Crabtrees received another blow when World of Sport was taken off the air. Wrestling instead got its own show, but the time slot changed from week to week, slowly driving away the regular audience. Far worse for Joint Promotions, however, was that with their contract up for renewal at the start of 1987, they were forced to share the TV rights as part of a rotation system with All Star Wrestling and America's World Wrestling Federation (WWF). The introduction of American wrestling to
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#17328590372827436-486: The D Block. In the semi-final round, Ospreay defeated C Block winner Tetsuya Naito to advance to the tournament finals. In the finals, Ospreay lost to Okada. Following his G1 loss, Ospreay continued to defend his IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship, avenging a D-Block G1 loss to David Finlay and defeating him at NJPW Burning Spirit in September. In October at Royal Quest II , Ospreay defeated Shota Umino . At Battle Autumn in November, Ospreay again retained
7579-556: The FWA commonly featured a mixture of British and American performers, beginning a trend that would continue for the decades to come. By the early 2010s, wrestling stars such as PAC , Britani Knight , and Martin Stone continued to gravitate towards immigrating to the United States, however not before having spent several years performing in the UK first. Digital TV channel The Wrestling Channel , later rebranded The Fight Network, ran for five years in
7722-515: The IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship to Hiromu Takahashi . He suffered an heel injury during the match, reportedly from landing on his feet when Takahashi dropped him from the top rope. On 2 February at The New Beginning in Sapporo , Ospreay was unsuccessful at winning British Heavyweight Championship from Zack Sabre Jr. On 4 February during the Road to New Beginning tour, Ospreay pinned Sabre Jr. in
7865-681: The Joint Promotions and soon looked elsewhere for exposure mainly outside the UK as a whole. As a result, there was a rise in New Japan Pro-Wrestling and Stampede Wrestling 's junior-heavyweight divisions, both of which had their roots in British wrestling of the time. One English promoter that benefited from the backlash against the Crabtrees was Merseyside promoter Brian Dixon, operator of All Star Wrestling which began capitalizing on this disaffection by taking many of Joint Promotions' top stars and running shows head to head with them on
8008-577: The London Riots' IPW:UK and New Generation Wrestling Tag Team Championship on the line, without Robinson. Ospreay has been unable to replicate similar success as a singles wrestler, twice entering the Zero G tournament but failing to win. Ospreay also became a regular for Southside Wrestling Entertainment (SWE) from March 2014 onwards. After failing to win the Speed King Championship from Kay Lee Ray in
8151-691: The MCW Intercommonwealth Championship. After the Global Wars UK event, where Ospreay faced Kazuchika Okada , New Japan wrestlers Hiroshi Tanahashi , AJ Styles and Okada recommended him to NJPW. On 3 March 2016, Ospreay was announced as the newest member of the NJPW stable Chaos . Appearing in a video, Ospreay challenged Kushida to an IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship match at Invasion Attack 2016 on 10 April. On 10 April, Ospreay failed in his title challenge against Kushida. Following
8294-574: The PWA Heavyweight Championship for the first time. Afterwards, Ospreay announced that he was moving to Australia and would begin working regularly for PWA and other local independent promotions. Ospreay stated that he felt he could help the Australian wrestling scene grow, while the U.K. scene did not need him. Days later, Ospreay faced Adam Brooks in the main event of a Melbourne City Wrestling show, Ballroom Brawl ; defeating him to win
8437-585: The SWE Heavyweight Championship but on 7 August won the Speed King championship for the second time from Andrew Everett . On 27 August 2016 Ospreay posted a Facebook live video unveiling a new British Triangle Championship with his three Swords of Essex partners Paul Robinson, Jerry Sevanchez, and Scott Wainwright. They announced that the trios championships were not specific to any promotion and could therefore be defended anywhere. Ospreay wrestled
8580-401: The Super Juniors tournament with a record of five wins and two losses, advancing to his second consecutive final. On 3 June, Ospreay was defeated in the final by Kushida. On 9 October at King of Pro-Wrestling , Ospreay defeated Kushida to win the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship for the first time. With the win, Ospreay became the first British IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion. He lost
8723-401: The UK and Japan, helping to develop their prominence in both countries. As the American professional wrestling market became more competitive following the creation of All Elite Wrestling in 2019, this resulted in American companies taking a renewed interest in directly securing the British market. In 2020, at WrestleMania 36 , Scotland's Drew McIntyre became the first British wrestler to win
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#17328590372828866-480: The UK and the eventual axing in 1988 by Greg Dyke of Wrestling shows on terrestrial TV saw the eclipse of Joint Promotions from its dominant position in the British wrestling scene. The promotion, renamed Ring Wrestling Stars (RWS) in 1991, continued to tour the old venues with Big Daddy in the headline slot until his retirement in December 1993 after suffering a stroke. Even then, Max Crabtree continued to tour, using
9009-538: The US title, in which Ospreay and former champion Hiroshi Tanahashi expressed interest in fighting for the vacant title. Ospreay returned to the NJPW United States shows on 16 April at Windy City Riot to face Jon Moxley , who Ospreay had called out at Resurgence and in post-match interviews during his New Japan Cup run. At the event, he was defeated. Ospreay challenged for the US title at Capital Collision on 14 May in
9152-406: The US, likewise, this period saw the increasing use of American stars on British shows. There was also an increasing degree of crossover between the traditional "Old School" and Americanised "New School" promotions after one of the latter, Frontier Wrestling Alliance featured an invasion storyline featuring traditional veterans from the former faction. New promotions such as One Pro Wrestling and
9295-797: The Undisputed British Heavyweight Championship from Zack Sabre Jr. At High Stakes on 14 February 2020, Ospreay defeated Sabre Jr. to win the Undisputed British Heavyweight Championship. Following RevPro events being hindered due to the Covid-19 Pandemic , Ospreay made his first title defence on 4 October at RevPro Epic Encounters 3, defeating Kyle Fletcher . On 15 November 2020, Ospreay made another defence, defeating Ricky Knight Jr. at RevPro Epic Encounters 5. The following year at RevPro's Ninth Anniversary on 21 August 2021, Ospreay defended his title against Doug Williams . A month later, Ospreay once again defeated Knight Jr
9438-584: The United Kingdom and appearing for American promotions such as Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA). For example, TNA's "2004 X Cup" featured All Star Wrestling wrestlers James Mason, Dean Allmark , Robbie Dynamite and Frankie Sloan as Team Britain while McGuinness would become highly prominent in Ring of Honor (ROH), first as their ROH Pure Champion in 2005 before becoming their ROH World Champion in 2007. In addition to British stars increasingly performing in
9581-747: The United Kingdom combining worldwide wrestling programming with coverage of selected current British promotions as well as extensive rescreenings of vintage 1970s/1980s ITV footage (branded as World of Sport after the segment's parent show), exposing the history of British wrestling to a new younger audience. After the channel's 2008 closure, the repeats continued on other stations such as Men and Movies . Much of this footage, as well as original ITV broadcasts of matches, has since been uploaded to YouTube, further expanding classic British wrestling's outreach to international wrestling fandom The mid 2010s saw an increasing drive to return British Wrestling to ITV. A pilot for World of Sport Wrestling (branding itself as
9724-623: The United Kingdom. This, combined with strategic partnerships with Japanese professional wrestling promotions, allowed for a new generation of professional wrestlers such as Will Ospreay , Zack Sabre Jr. and Pete Dunne to rise to prominence internationally. For many centuries, there have been wrestling tournaments (for example in Cornish wrestling or Scottish Backhold ) throughout the British Isles where individual prizes have been comparable to yearly salaries and where monarchs and lords have been in
9867-510: The United States back in the 1890s, became the new dominant style in Britain. With Lancashire catch-as-catch-can already a major amateur sport particularly in Northern England, there existed a ready-made source of potential recruits to professional wrestling. Amateur wrestler, Sir Atholl Oakeley got together with fellow grappler Henry Irslinger to launch one of the first promotions to employ
10010-525: The World and British titles had some credibility (particularly as they were often placed on the more legitimate wrestlers), the addition of European, Empire/Commonwealth, Scottish, Welsh, and area championships got out of hand, and at one point there were conceivably 70 different titleholders to keep track of within Joint Promotions alone. In practice, the British, European and World titles were given most prominence. The "regional" titles were mainly honorific, with only
10153-565: The Wrestling Channel and elsewhere, copious old Reslo footage has also been repeated on S4C Digidol and uploaded to Youtube. Since Williams' death in November 2009, he was succeeded by Alan Ravenhill, who operates Welsh Wrestling. Other promotions in Wales include Attack! Pro Wrestling , Britannia Pro Wrestling (BWP), FUSION Pro Wrestling, Slammasters Wrestling, Basix, Pro Wrestling Karnage, Exist, Exposure Wrestling, and Creation Pro. Scotland
10296-418: The abrupt retirement of Crabtree in 1966. Lincoln's own promotion was bought out and amalgamated into Joint Promotions at the end of the 1960s. By 1975, the stranglehold of Joint Promotions had almost crumbled, with many of its founding members retiring and the company being bought out several times, leading to the wrestling industry being run as a private subsidiary of state-run bookmakers William Hill PLC ,
10439-429: The audiences or indeed participated. At the start of the 20th century, wrestling was introduced to the public as part of a variety act to spice up the limited action involved in the bodybuilder strongman attractions. One of its earliest stars was a Cornish - American ex- miner named Jack Carkeek (world Cornish wrestling champion in 1886 ), who would challenge audience members to last ten minutes with him in
10582-424: The business. It was the promoters themselves, however, who revolutionized the business. During this time, under the guise of an alliance of promoters attempting to regulate the sport and uphold the committee's ideas, the promoters created a cartel based on America's National Wrestling Alliance territory system that was designed to carve up control of the business among a handful of promoters—which it did in 1952 under
10725-531: The co-promoted BritWres-Fest on 1 April 2012 as the masked character Dark Britannico, the evil twin of Leon Britannico who was played by Paul Robinson, Ospreay's future tag team partner in the team The Swords of Essex . While wrestling with Lucha Britannia he twice won the Lucha Britannia World Championship . Ospreay soon became a regular for Progress Wrestling , debuting for them at Chapter Two: The March of Progress with Alex Esmail in
10868-555: The committee was to create seven formal weight divisions, calling for champions to be crowned at each weight. These weight divisions included lightweight (154-pound limit), welterweight (165), middleweight (176), heavy middleweight (187), light heavyweight (198), mid heavyweight (209), and heavyweight . Many of these rules diverged heavily from those used in American Wrestling – five-minute rounds (three minutes for title matches), two public warnings for rule breaking before
11011-476: The domestic market. Some, such as All Star, Steve Barker's Rumble Wrestling (active 1984-2001 and 2019-present) John Freemantle's Premier Promotions (active 1987-present), and Scott Conway's The Wrestling Alliance (TWA, active 1989-2003), continued to preserve the traditional British wrestling style while many newly created promotions rejected the Mountevans rules and technical style of wrestling entirely in favour of
11154-465: The early 1990s. All Star's post-television boom wore off after 1993 when Nagasaki retired for a second time. However, the promotion kept afloat on live shows at certain established venues and particularly on the holiday camp circuit and remains active right up to the present. Meanwhile, the WWF continued on Sky television , while its chief rival back home in America, World Championship Wrestling (WCW) made
11297-503: The entry of the American World Wrestling Federation into the market in the late 1980s, contributed to a decline in support for domestic British wrestling and stars. In 1985, World of Sport ended, and a subsequent stand-alone wrestling programme lasted until the end of 1988. Without mainstream television access, domestically produced professional wrestling would struggle in the United Kingdom. Nonetheless,
11440-418: The final episode of NXT UK aired, with WWE folding the entire NXT UK project. The 2010s were also characterised by increasing cooperation between British promotions such as Progress Wrestling and RevPro with Japanese promotions such as New Japan Pro Wrestling . Through these partnerships, professional wrestlers such as Zack Sabre Jr and Will Ospreay were able to split their time between performing in
11583-574: The final of the UK Super 8 tournament in both 2014 and 2015, losing to Zack Sabre, Jr and Rampage Brown respectively. He won the 30-man Battle Royale 2014 in April but failed to win it the following year when the All England Championship was on the line. On 28 March 2016, Ospreay lost a Loser Leaves Town match to his former Spitfire Britannia partner Dawkins. The Swords of Essex began wrestling for Future Pro Wrestling (FPW) in May 2013 and after
11726-594: The final two teams standing in a four-team elimination match to decide contenders to the Progress Tag Team Championship . During the match, Ospreay, having been isolated for some time, reached out to tag his partner but Robinson jumped off the apron and walked out on Ospreay. Ospreay was left on his own and lost the match, after which the Progress Champion Jimmy Havoc came to the ring and ordered London Riots to tie Ospreay. Havoc pulled out
11869-562: The first round of the Progress Tag Team Championship tournament, with FSU (Andrews' team with Eddie Dennis ) defeating The Swords of Essex (Ospreay's team with Paul Robinson). In his Natural Progression Series II opening match, his opponent Zack Gibson tried to win by holding the ropes. Robinson prevented Gibson using the ropes, which in turn distracted the referee for long enough for Gibson to low-blow Ospreay and make Ospreay submit. On 18 May, The Swords of Essex were one of
12012-406: The first time as well as becoming the first British holder of NJPW's top championship. At Wrestling Dontaku , Ospreay made his first defense of the title when he defeated Shingo Takagi. However, he suffered a neck injury during the match and was forced to vacate the title on 20 May 2021. Just three months after his injury, Ospreay made a surprise return at Resurgence on 14 August. He delivered
12155-532: The following day, Ospreay lost the Undisputed British Heavyweight Championship to Ricky Knight Jr, ending his reign at 919 days with 7 successful title defences. The reign made Ospreay the longest reigning Undisputed British Heavyweight Champion in history. Ospreay returned to RevPro, for the first time since losing his title at Revpro Uprising 2022 in December, defeating Tomohiro Ishii . Ospreay made sporadic appearances for RevPro for
12298-520: The following show. He lost the championship match in January after Havoc loosened the top rope, making it more difficult for Ospreay to do high-flying moves, and used it as a weapon. During the Spring Bank Holiday weekend, Ospreay defeated El Ligero, Mark Haskins, Roderick Strong and Zack Sabre, Jr across two days to win the first Super Strong Style 16 tournament and once again lay claim to Havoc's championship. Their rematch took place on 26 July in
12441-420: The future elements of " sports entertainment ". Numerous big-name stars came and went during the early inception of wrestling within the UK, with many, like Hackenschmidt, leaving for the US. The resulting loss of big-name stars sent the business into decline before the outbreak of World War I in 1914 halted it completely. While various styles of amateur wrestling continued as legitimate sports, grappling as
12584-514: The general chaos which had surrounded "All In" Wrestling prior to the War prompted Admiral Lord Mountevans , a fan of the sport, to collaborate with Commander Campbell (a member of the popular The Brains Trust radio panel show), member of parliament Maurice Webb and Olympic wrestler Norman Morell to create a committee to produce official rules for wrestling. These rules became known as Admiral-Lord Mountevans rules . The most notable action of
12727-420: The group. By agreeing to rotate talent and block out rival promoters, Joint Promotions was soon running 40 shows a week, while leaving wrestlers with little bargaining power. The financial advantages of this arrangement helped the members survive the tough conditions caused by a post-war tax that took 25% of all entertainment revenue. Other promoters were not so successful. The closure of Harringay Arena in 1954
12870-416: The heel "Battling Guardsman" and then being rebranded as Big Daddy two years later. After an initial transition period as a heel / tweener in the mid-1970s (most notable for his tag team partnership with future arch-rival Giant Haystacks and a heel vs heel feud with legendary masked wrestler Kendo Nagasaki , whom Daddy unmasked during a 1975 televised bout), from the summer of 1977 onwards, Big Daddy became
13013-450: The jump from late-night ITV to British Wrestling's old Saturday afternoon ITV timeslot, where it stayed until moving to Super Channel at the end of 1995 and then Channel 5 on Friday evenings from mid-1999 until WCW's demise in 2001. Both major 1990s US promotions made several arena tours of the UK while the WWF held the pay-per-view event SummerSlam 1992 in London 's Wembley Stadium before
13156-533: The largely untelevised live circuit survived and at times thrived with some promotions featuring the traditional British style of wrestling, while others adopted the contemporary American independent style. In the 21st century, mirroring the growing strength of the Independent circuit in the United States, support for domestic professional wrestling once again began to grow, leading to the rise of several prominent and stable independent wrestling promotions throughout
13299-512: The late 1980s. Tag wrestling , however, did prove to be popular, with televised tag matches happening a mere eight or so times a year to keep them special. The success of wrestling on television did however create a better opportunity for the independent groups. The opposition to Joint came from the Australian-born promoter, Paul Lincoln . Having promoted shows in the 1950s with himself in the main event as masked heel Doctor Death, Lincoln led
13442-416: The latter's Progress World Championship match leading to a Fans Bring The Weapons match in March. During the match, Ospreay challenged Havoc to put their Progress contracts at stake before losing the match and leaving the promotion. Ospreay returned at the last event of 2017 as a mystery opponent for Progress Champion Travis Banks , however he lost the match. On chapter 61, Ospreay defeated Adam Brooks, this
13585-406: The live event business as wrestling became part of mainstream culture. By the mid-1960s, Joint Promotions had doubled their live event schedule to somewhere in the region of 4,500 shows a year. Every town of note had a show at least once a month, and at some points more than 30 cities had a weekly date. The style of wrestling at the time was unique – not only in terms of the rule system, but also for
13728-578: The local UK wrestling circuit, organising a WWE United Kingdom Championship Tournament in Blackpool in January 2017, which crowned the inaugural WWE United Kingdom Champion . Several professional wrestling journalists reported that the WWE's renewed interest in the region was to prevent the World of Sport Wrestling programme from succeeding. The World Of Sport Wrestling TV revival resumed production in May 2018 and
13871-492: The match before tagging Daddy in for the finish. Basing a whole cartel around one performer, however, though good for television, produced mixed results for live events. While Big Daddy was a massive draw in terms of family audiences, in equal part he alienated much of the existing adult fanbase for wrestling. Many wrestlers shared the adult fans' dislike of the Big Daddy phenomenon. They were dissatisfied with their position within
14014-543: The match third and was immediately low-blowed by Robinson, who had already entered, who disqualified himself in the hopes of taking out Ospreay. Ospreay recovered and eventually eliminated Marty Scurll last to win Thunderbastard. The following show saw Ospreay team up with FSU and Noam Dar in an eight-man tag team match with FSU and Havoc's respective titles, Ospreay's title contendership and everyone else's Progress contracts at stake, depending which individual lost. During
14157-611: The match to "a gymnastics routine". The debate escalated over Twitter , with many wrestling journalists and veterans weighing in on the debate. Their match eventually took place on 12 August, with Ospreay losing to Vader after Dunne interfered while the referee was distracted. On 13 April 2017, Ospreay lost the British Cruiserweight Championship to interim champion Josh Bodom. Following a non-title contest against Zack Sabre Jr at 'Monday Night Mayhem' in Portsmouth in which Ospreay won, on 10 November 2017 at Global Wars, Ospreay failed to win
14300-547: The match, Ospreay moonsaulted from the Electric Ballroom 's balcony onto his opponents, on the floor. Later, he had Havoc in position to be pinned but as he jumped from the top rope, Robinson dragged Havoc outside, leading Ospreay to pin Davis and end the London Riots' contract with Progress. At the next event, Ospreay defeated Robinson and announced he would invoke his Thunderbastard right to challenge for Havoc's championship at
14443-414: The match, Ospreay was legitimately injured after his foot hit the rope mid-rotation after attempting a Spanish Fly off of the ring apron, causing him to land on his head on top of the apron and begin bleeding profusely from his scalp. At Wrestling Dontaku 2018 after successfully defending his title in a rematch against Kushida, he was attacked by the newest Bullet Club member, Taiji Ishimori . He entered
14586-408: The match, it was reported that NJPW had offered Ospreay a contract to become a regular for the promotion. The following month, Ospreay entered the 2016 Best of the Super Juniors tournament. On 27 May, Ospreay faced Ricochet in the tournament in a match, which received widespread attention in the professional wrestling world. William Regal praised the match. Vader , however, compared the match to
14729-668: The name of Joint Promotions . Joint Promotions was represented in London by the Dale Martin promotion, which had incorporated in 1948, and involved Les Martin, and the brothers Jack, Johnny and Billy Dale. Other promoters included Norman Morell and Ted Beresford in Yorkshire , Billy Best in Liverpool , Arthur Wright in Manchester and George de Relywyskow in Scotland , with Arthur Green the secretary of
14872-413: The new Cruiserweight Champion Pete Dunne in a non-title triple threat match, as well as beating Mike Bailey, which saw him earn a Cruiserweight Championship match against Dunne on 10 July which he won. The following month Ospreay headlined York Hall in a match against Vader . The feud began after Vader had criticised an NJPW Best of the Super Juniors match between Ospreay and Ricochet in May, comparing
15015-537: The new style of wrestling which was coined "All-in" wrestling. Though, like many wrestlers throughout the business, Oakeley would claim his wrestling was entirely legitimate, his claim was highly dubious. Under the British Wrestling Association banner, Oakeley's promotion took off with wrestlers such as Tommy Mann, Black Butcher Johnson, Jack Pye , Norman "the Butcher" Ansell, "College Boy", and Jack Sherry on
15158-450: The official ITV wrestling compilation VHS release Mayhem and Mystery . Similarly, highlights of Alan Kilby 's capture of the vacant title in a tournament final over King Ben in Preston , 7 October 1981, were included on official ITV wrestling compilation DVD release The Best Of British Wrestling A-Z . The title was founded in 1953 and remained in Joint Promotions until the mid-1980s when it
15301-474: The proceedings. Women wrestlers and mud-filled rings also became common place. In the late 1930s, the London County Council banned professional wrestling, leaving the business in rough shape just before World War II . After the war, attempts to relaunch the business in 1947 failed to catch on with journalists, who condemned the gimmickry of professional wrestling as "fake". The revelation of this, and
15444-534: The professional wrestling slot on World of Sport as well as standalone broadcasts. Pre-publicity for these championship match broadcasts was given in ITV's nationally published listings magazine TVTimes The entire 31 October 1987 edition of the standalone Wrestling broadcast was given over to Fit Finlay 's recapture of the title from Chic Cullen in Bradford , 17 September 1987 and highlights of this match were included on
15587-871: The promotion's tour of the United Kingdom. Ospreay unsuccessfully entered the 2016 Joker's Wild tournament and challenged for both the TNA King of the Mountain Championship and TNA World Tag Team Championship . Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter reported that TNA had plans to push Ospreay, but upon finding out that he had signed to appear for NJPW relegated him to a short match on their secondary television programme. On 1 April 2016, Ospreay made his debut for Evolve , losing to Zack Sabre Jr. at Evolve 58 and Ricochet at Evolve 59 , both in Dallas, Texas, USA. On 12 July, Paul Heyman , during
15730-413: The remainder of 2023, defeating the likes of Big Damo , Luke Jacobs and Eddie Dennis . Ospreay had a standout match on 9 July at RevPro Epic Encounter, defeating Leon Slater. On 26 August, at RevPro 11th Anniversary Show , Ospreay defeated Shingo Takagi , ahead of his match against Chris Jericho at All Elite Wrestling 's (AEW) All In at Wembley Stadium , leading to Jericho making an appearance at
15873-525: The rest of the year in showcase matches against non-regular Progress wrestlers, losing to Zack Sabre Jr., Shane Strickland, Matt Riddle and Adam Cole. Finally on 30 December, at a card composed exclusively of unannounced matches, Ospreay lost to Havoc. After the match Havoc invited Ospreay to join him in his fight against British Strong Style , who held the World and Tag Team Championship. Ospreay instead attacked Havoc and then realigned with Swords of Essex partner Paul Robinson. Ospreay attacked Havoc again, during
16016-494: The returning young lion Great-O-Khan . After the match, Ospreay attacked Okada, turning heel , leaving Chaos, and forming a new stable called United Empire . Ospreay then won the 2021 New Japan Cup as well as winning the right to challenge Kota Ibushi for the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship at Sakura Genesis . At the event, Ospreay defeated Ibushi to win the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship for
16159-473: The ring. The development of wrestling within the UK brought legitimate Greco-Roman grappler Georg Hackenschmidt who was born in the Russian Empire to the country, where he would quickly associate himself with promoter and entrepreneur Charles B. Cochran . Cochran took Hackenschmidt under his wing and booked him into a match in which Hackenschmidt defeated another top British wrestler, Tom Cannon , for
16302-438: The roster, while Oakeley himself would win a series of matches to be crowned the first British Heavyweight Champion . The business was reaching one of its highest points at the time, with the best part of forty regular venues in London alone. The great demand for wrestling, however, meant there were not enough skilled amateurs to go around, and many promoters switched to more violent styles , with weapons and chairshots part of
16445-582: The same business model, with British-born former WWF star "British Bulldog" Davey Boy Smith replacing Daddy as the headlining household name, until Smith was lured back to the WWF in the summer of 1994. Thereafter, RWS went into decline and eventually ceased promoting in 1995. By contrast, All Star had used its two years of TV exposure to build up a returning Kendo Nagasaki as its lead heel and established such storylines as his tag team-cum-feud with Rollerball Rocco and his " hypnotism " of Robbie Brookside . The end of TV coverage left many of these storylines at
16588-418: The same night in the same town. Professional wrestling as a whole seemingly began to fall into disarray as the true nature of wrestling began to fall into question as many newspapers tried to expose the worked aspects of the sport. However, this trend did not ultimately harm the industries as the suspension of disbelief was all too easy to maintain for fans, even if they knew the truth. On 28 September 1985,
16731-532: The same night, he challenged the new NEVER Openweight Champion, Kota Ibushi , to a championship match at Wrestle Kingdom 13. On 4 January, at Wrestle Kingdom 13 , Will Ospreay defeated Kota Ibushi to capture the NEVER Openweight Championship. He became the first Junior Heavyweight to hold the championship. He made his first title defense at RevPro New Year's Resolution, where he defeated Chris Brookes . On 22 February, Ospreay successfully retained
16874-509: The show and attacking Ospreay. At RevPro Uprising on 16 December, Ospreay defeated Gabe Kidd . Following the match, Ospreay announced that ahead of his recent signing to AEW, 18 February 2024 would be his final RevPro event. On 18 February, Ospreay unsuccessfully challenged Michael Oku for the Undisputed British Heavyweight Championship at High Stakes , this marked Ospreay's final appearance for RevPro. On 29 January 2016, Ospreay made his debut for Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA), during
17017-526: The strong emphasis on clean technical wrestling. Heels made up a minority of the roster, with most shows containing an abnormally high proportion of clean sportsmanly matches between two "blue-eyes" (as faces were known backstage in the UK). This continued for several decades. Gimmick matches were a rarity, and midget wrestling failed to catch on, while women were banned by the Greater London Council until
17160-443: The third time in his career. With this wrestling match being awarded 5 stars, Dave Meltzer and Bryan Alvarez suggested that Will Ospreay has reached a point in his career where he is a serious contender for being the best wrestler in the world. After winning the title, Ospreay announced his intention to enter the G1 Climax 29 in his quest of bridging the gap between heavyweight and junior heavyweight wrestlers. Later that week, Ospreay
17303-457: The title against Dalton Castle at Honor Rising: Japan 2018 . At New Japan's Anniversary Show, he faced IWGP Heavyweight Champion Jay White in a losing effort. Despite still being classified as a Junior Heavyweight, Ospreay entered the 2019 New Japan Cup , beating Bad Luck Fale and Lance Archer , before being eliminated by fellow Chaos member Kazuchika Okada . It was announced that Ospreay will face ROH Television Champion Jeff Cobb in
17446-502: The title to Marty Scurll in his first defence on 5 November at Power Struggle . Ospreay regained the title from Scurll on 4 January 2018 at Wrestle Kingdom 12 in Tokyo Dome in a four-way match, also involving Hiromu Takahashi and Kushida. On 10 February, Ospreay retained the title against Hiromu Takahashi at The New Beginning in Osaka . On 1 April, Ospreay successfully retained the title against Marty Scurll at Sakura Genesis . During
17589-542: The title, defeating Tetsuya Naito once more. After his defence against Naito, Ospreay was confronted by Umino, who made his return to Japan and was struck down by him. Umino challenged Ospreay for the US Championship at Historic X-Over , where at the event Ospreay defeated him. After the match, Kenny Omega of All Elite Wrestling appeared on the titantron belittling Ospreay and challenged him to an IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship match at Wrestle Kingdom 17 ,
17732-751: The tournament but reforming the Swords of Essex when his former tag partner Paul Robinson would come out to give his support. On Day 3, although being eliminated from the tournament, The Swords of Essex would be assisted by Callum Newman to take on CPF in a tag match in a winning effort. It is currently unknown what Ospreay's plans with Progress Wrestling are after this event. Ospreay has regularly wrestled for International Pro Wrestling: United Kingdom (IPW: UK) since September 2012 in singles matches, with Robinson as Swords of Essex and with Tom Dawkins as Spitfire Britannia, playing off their alter egos Pure Britannico and Neo Britannico for Lucha Britannia. Ospreay made it through to
17875-421: The tournament final. The tournament final commenced at Dominion 6.4 in Osaka-jo Hall the following month, where Ospreay defeated Lance Archer , to become the new #1 contender for Omega's title. On 6 June at a NJPW press conference, the rematch between Ospreay and Omega for the title was confirmed to take place later in the month at Forbidden Door . On 25 June at Forbidden Door, Ospreay defeated Omega to regain
18018-534: The tournament for the second time, earning an IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship match at Dominion . The match between Ospreay and Shingo was awarded a 5.75 rating by Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, the highest rating for a wrestling match in 2019. This was also the first match in which Shingo Takagi was pinned after his debut in NJPW. At Dominion , Ospreay defeated Dragon Lee and became IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship for
18161-440: The tournament, he defeated Bushi , El Phantasmo and IWGP United States Heavyweight Champion Sanada , to make it to the tournament quarterfinals. During his third-round match, Ospreay fractured Sanada's orbital bone causing him to win the match by referee stoppage. In the quarterfinal round, he lost to the eventual winner Zack Sabre Jr . After the tournament, at Hyper Battle , it was announced Sanada would be forced to vacate
18304-458: The win. After the match, Ospreay called out Taichi for a NEVER Openweight Championship match and doing so, hinting going to the Heavyweight division. The match was made official for Power Struggle (2018) , however, it was announced on Twitter that the match had been cancelled due to Ospreay's injury. On the final day of World Tag League, Ospreay returned to New Japan, where he defeated Taichi. On
18447-401: Was a founder and was quoted, "We're the pirates". One of Joint Promotions' first moves was establishing (and controlling) the championships called for by the Mountevans' committee. At first, this proved a profitable venture, with title matches leading to raised ticket prices. However, perhaps inevitably, attempts to extend this success by bringing in additional titles led to overexposure. While
18590-475: Was also the winner of 2021 New Japan Cup . Ospreay is a former two-time and the final IWGP United States Heavyweight Champion , as the title was deactivated in December 2023 when Ospreay was in his second reign. Before signing with AEW, Ospreay had also periodically ventured into the American wrestling circuit; he made appearances in NJPW partner promotions Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA, formerly known as Impact Wrestling) and Ring of Honor (ROH), where he
18733-505: Was announced Ospreay had suffered a shoulder injury and would forfeit his place in the tournament, causing Davis to take his place and advance to the next round. In April, NJPW announced a tournament to find a new #1 contender for Kenny Omega's IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship, where Ospreay was announced as one of four participants in the tournament, signaling his return from injury. Ospreay returned to action on 21 May at Resurgence , where he defeated Hiroshi Tanahashi to advance to
18876-463: Was announced as a participant in the 2019 G1 Climax . Ospreay made his first IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship title defense against Robbie Eagles at Southern Showdown in Melbourne. He started the G1 Climax campaign at G1 Climax in Dallas , where he was defeated by Lance Archer . He obtained his first win by defeating Sanada , but lost in the third round of the tournament against Kota Ibushi in
19019-623: Was announced that Ospreay would face the winner of the 4 January main event, on 5 January, to unify the World Championships. On 4 January, Kazuchika Okada defeated Shingo Takagi to win the World Championship. On 5 January, Okada defeated Ospreay to win and unify both World Championships. After his defeat, Ospreay stuck around in Japan, teaming with his United Empire teammates. Ospreay was eventually announced for that year's New Japan Cup . In
19162-530: Was born in London's Havering borough on 7 May 1993. He decided to become a wrestler after watching the three-way match between AJ Styles , Christopher Daniels , and Samoa Joe at TNA 's 2005 Unbreakable event. Ospreay, alongside friend Kip Sabian , would engage in backyard wrestling before Ospreay received formal professional wrestling training at Lucha Britannia 's London School of Lucha Libre in Bethnal Green . Ospreay made his professional debut at
19305-420: Was broadcast on ITV between 28 July and 29 September 2018. In July 2018 WWE announced that they would be launching NXT UK , a new development promotion to be based directly in the UK. Ultimately, the attempted revival would flounder and in 2019 a frustrated ITV moved on from the project, opting instead to begin airing programming from the newly created American promotion All Elite Wrestling . On 1 September 2022
19448-445: Was granted another shot at the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship, but was again defeated by Kushida on 19 June at Dominion 6.19 in Osaka-jo Hall . On 20 July, Ospreay entered the 2016 Super J-Cup , defeating Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL) representative Titán in his first round match. On 21 August, he was eliminated from the tournament in the second round by Matt Sydal . On 8 October, Ospreay received his first shot at
19591-519: Was his first victory in the promotion since losing the Progress Championship in 2016. At Progress Chapter 66, Ospreay defeated Mark Haskins. On 7 May 2018, day 3 of the 2018 Super Strong Style 16 tournament, Ospreay challenged Jimmy Havoc to a match at Wembley Arena on 30 September 2018, but was forced to withdraw due to contractual obligations with New Japan Pro-Wrestling. The match was then set for Chapter 75, with Ospreay emerging victorious in
19734-520: Was represented as part of Joint Promotions by Relwyskow Promotions, run by the family of George de Relwyskow . Relwyskow Promotions was not included in the buyouts of Joint Promotions in the 1960s-1980s and remained under its original management while continuing to receive a proportion of Joint Promotions' TV coverage. It remained active until the retirement of Ann Relwyskow in 1994. In 1990 and again in 1993, television tapings were held in Scotland and matches screened on Grampian Television and STV . During
19877-459: Was successful, and wrestling became a featured attraction every Saturday afternoon from autumn to spring each year. In 1964, it went full-time as part of the World of Sport sports compilation programme. Televised wrestling allowed wrestlers to become household names and allowed personality to get a wrestler over just as much as size. The exposure of wrestling on television proved the ultimate boost to
20020-493: Was taken over by All Star Wrestling . The title remained active until the mid-1990s. location= Professional wrestling in the United Kingdom Mid 20th Century 1970s and 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s and 2020s The history of professional wrestling in the United Kingdom spans over one hundred years. After a brief spell of popularity for Greco Roman professional wrestling during
20163-553: Was the last straw for Atholl Oakeley, and Joint Promotions were the only major player left to benefit when Chancellor Peter Thorneycroft abolished the entertainment tax in the 1957 budget. From a press report, some wrestlers decided to go on strike against the Joint Promotions cartel and formed the Wrestlers' Welfare Society for hardship relief but also to act as an employment agency. Bill Benny ('Man Mountain', 1918, Cornwall - 1963, Manchester) wrestler, promoter and nightclubs owner,
20306-551: Was victorious, although he didn't possess the championship belt, due to former champion Robinson refusing to give back his vacated championship. Also on 12 June during Dominion, Ospreay was announced as a participant in the G1 Climax 32 tournament starting in July, as a part of the D block. Ospreay scored 8 points in his block, advancing to the semi-finals and gaining the physical IWGP United States Championship belt from former champion Juice Robinson and David Finlay , who both competed in
20449-455: Was what people wanted to see. Big Daddy became one of the best-known wrestler in British history and even had his own comic strip in Buster comic. Due to his popularity, Crabtree's run was extended by carefully positioning him in tag matches, allowing a host of young partners (which included Young David , Dynamite Kid , Chris Adams , Sammy Lee , Kwik Kick Lee and Steve Regal ) to carry
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