By Mark Worrall@Hoohoowozza
COLLINGWOOD CENTRE-GREAT BARR-BIRMINGHAM
SATURDAY 16 JUNE 2018
The Collingwood Centre is merely a ten minute walk for me from my house, so with Kamikaze Pro putting on their Academy show, their third Academy show this year, going to this show was a no brainer for me!
Looking at the card for the show, a basic mixture of Academy talent and regular main roster members, I could not help but being impressed with the way the card was made up and the matches carefully put together and meaning something. One could forgive a promotion putting a card of trainees together with the prowess of giving the new young batch of talent some ring time. However, Kamikaze Pro are back on the up and are having a really good 2018 and there is some seriously good talent developing amongst the Kamikaze dojo and the future looks bright!
Saturday was a very warm day, and the temperature in the Collingwood Centre was really warm and I admit to feeling a little uncomfortable at times which does not always help my mood, however the show started promptly (as Kamikaze shows always do!) and the show opener saw the Croatian savage Deno Babic facing British workhorse El Ligero, who was obviously opening the show as he had another booking later on that same night! Ring Announcer Colin Russell-Ames reminds the crowd that El Ligero is now signed to a WWE contract, hyping up the fact that a WWE star is wrestling for Kamikaze Pro, and I have no doubt putting over the fact that one of the UK’s hardest working wrestlers finally got himself a good deal that in my opinion is well deserved. The match began with some nice grappling that culminated in Badic walking away on his hands that the crowd enjoyed. To be fair to Ligero, he allowed Badic to show the viewing audience just what he could do. After a sequence of roll ups and reversals and pin attempts that tired out poor Laurie who was refereeing this match! Badic began to get some nice moves including my favourite move in wrestling, the Northern Lights suplex that he executed really well and followed up with a classic fisherman’s buster that got him a near fall in a following pin attempt. Ligero, enjoying his comedic side handed the leg of Badic to the referee which threw both Laurie and Badic enabling the Mexican sensation to nail a cutter, following up with a top turnbuckle splash! Victory for Ligero but also a good showing from Badic in what was a nice opening match.
One thing of note was the crowd for this event. The crowd must have been double of their previous show back in February and the difference in atmosphere and noise and fan reaction for the matches was terrific! Even the ten minute downpour that occurred during the first half of the show couldn’t dampen anybody’s spirit, and in fact for myself, this helped cool down the room for a short while!
Next up was Kenny Kilbane facing Kieran McQueen. The difference in size was well noticeable and was basically a squash for Kilbane who methodically beat down his opponent nailing several sidewalk slams whilst geeing the crowd at the same time. In fairness to Kilbane, he took his time allowing McQueen to attempt a couple of sleeper holds in hope of wearing his bigger opponent down. However this David and Goliath type story did not work so well with the obvious size difference it was a matter of time until Kilbane hit McQueen with a F5 that would have left Brock Lesner with nothing to worry about and the match done.
Third match in and the Fighting Females of Kamikaze make an appearance with Harley Faith facing Australian Charlie Evans. Harley is well over with this crowd who showed their appreciation for the youngster with Charlie looking a little put out by the boos aimed towards herself! (Kayfabe maybe?). This is my second time of seeing Harley in action and I admit to being extremely impressed in what she offers inside the ring, however she faces a strong opponent in Charlie Evans who I myself last saw having an excellent match with Millie McKenzie at the last Kamikaze Coventry show so I know of her capabilities. Faith took to using her elbows as a form of offence whilst Evans retaliated with some devastating kicks to the back of faith that would be a go to weapon for Charlie throughout the match. Whilst Charlie seemed like she was not used to receiving boos, she did play to those strengths has she attempted to wear down Faith who in return did the babyface comeback, and in style with a German suplex that ultimately set up a spot which enabled Harley to spear her way to victory. Great match this with Harley continuing to look a strong prospect.
The first of two title matches of the card brings us to our pre-interval match with current Kamikaze Pro Relentless division champion Sean Kustom facing former Kamikaze Pro Live champion Hammer Heeley. The Australian Kustom won his current title defeating Gabriel Kidd at the recent Coventry show in what was somewhat of an upset against the newly turned heel Kidd. For me, Kustom has a decent future; he has the look, the body and a good finisher in the Kustomizer. Maybe a little unusual to be defending a main roster title on a Pro Live show, however Heeley is a more than worthy opponent, even if this title never looked like it would be changing hands on this show. Another relentless Exchange of roll ups saw an exhausted referee counting plenty of near falls in a back and forth start to the match before Kustom took some control with some awesome Irish whips that Heeley sold bumping big time into the turnbuckle with the scars of those bumps showing visually on the beaten back of Heeley who rocked the whole ring when taking those bumps. Heeley is a good babyface and sells terrifically when taking bumps and perfectly rallied a comeback when the time was right nailing a top turnbuckle cutter on the Australian, which for a man of his size was well executed by Heeley and well sold by Kustom. The champion however found the moment and the Kustomizer ended Hammer Heeley’s title aspirations. Good way to end the first half with Kustom sportingly helping Heeley to his feet and taking to the microphone to put over his opponent.
Time for the interval and a chance for me to take some air as the room had gotten a little warmer again and a chance to think back at a good opening first half, even the downpour couldn’t cool down the room completely, so it was back in for the second half.
The Dave Scott Preston open challenge opened the second half of the show as the Autistic Assassin took to addressing the crowd and using his autism to get himself over which is to his credit as he left a smile on everybody’s face cutting his promo basically saying there was nobody in his league as he issued his challenge. Funnily enough his own smile soon left his face as his opponent made her way to the ring as Compare Colin announced his opponent has Chantal Jordan, a young girl, in fact the youngest competitor to ever set foot inside a Kamikaze ring and also the second only Fighting Female graduate out of the Kamikaze dojo. Chantel made her way ringside with some awesome entrance music that suited the moment well, sporting gloves and dressed more as a MMA fighter, in fact the rules of the match were changed to suit her style as this match became a three round five minute match. The opening round, in fact the only round, that seemingly went over five minutes saw Preston antagonizing Jordan until a sweet punch on the left cheek of Preston floored him. This was not the end though as Preston treated the crowd to some comical moments selling his rather weak offence whilst continuing to do press ups whilst Jordan was down. However Jordan would finally force Preston to submit after she no-selled the kicks from Preston as she won this open challenge. Postmatch Dave challenged Chantel to a proper wrestling match at the next Pro Live show on July 21st, claiming this match was not the advertised match! Great fun.
Match of the night next, for me anyway as Elliot Jordan and his experience! Took on Dereiss. I have to say that when somebody leaves an impression the first time I see them inside a wrestling ring, my second viewing of them can leave me a little apprehensive. Dereiss is a man I saw wrestle back in February defeating Mark Clarke and giving an excellent performance. Tonight he went one better, in performance anyway. He has the characteristics to be a big star, great entrance music that really suits his character is not always easy to put together but he does. Wrestling wise, his moves and execution are almost perfect, well for someone at this level, and to be honest seems slightly above the level he is wrestling at. It also helps having a really good opponent and Jordan is just that, whether you like him or not, he is good at what he does. This matched ticked the boxes; Dereiss ran rings around Jordan as the match began to a point where Jordan could not keep up with his opponent’s offence! However, as all good heels do though Jordan turned the match around and took a methodical approach, playing to his strengths whilst bating the crowd at the same time. Some really great executed moves throughout as they exchanged solid moves going back and forth until Deriess hitting a great standing moonsault resulted in a near fall that would be his last offence as Jordan nailed his Butterfly DDT to win an excellent match.
The problem with a great match is that sometimes it can enter your thoughts and refuse to leave for a while and the next match becomes somewhat of a blur! Not to disrespect the next match between Brendan Thomas and Alan Carter but the previous match somewhat distracted me for a while as Brendan, introduced from West Bromwich, which gained some boos from the Birmingham crowd faced Carter, who himself was making his in ring singles debut. If I am to be honest the fact this was Carter’s in ring singles debut showed as he struggled throughout the match with Thomas, a sixteen year veteran of the British scene worked tirelessly to help the debuting Carter which was a job in itself. Carter’s comic book persona could not find him any super powers to defeat Thomas who finally hit Carter with a sunset bomb to win the match. Carter albeit sloppy at times will learn from being in a match with a veteran such as Thomas and will get better over time, everybody as to start somewhere so fair play to him for getting into a ring.
We finally arrive at the main event, and an eventful main event it was! The Kamikaze Pro Live Championship was the prize for the winner of this match between Luke Douglas and Sean Devine. The day before the match Challenger Sean cut a good promo that was available on You Tube psyching himself up for the match. Champion Douglas carries the title well as the match started really aggressively in what turned into a real fist fight until Douglas took to controlling a large portion of the match which left one member of the on-looking crowd taking exception to the beating the champion was dishing out on what I believe is her grandson in Devine. Sean managed to scramble himself to the ropes after Douglas had secured an Indian death lock on the challenger as he rallied and fought his way back as the crowd rallied and Sean’s number one fan seem to relax whenever Sean got in some offence and a Samoan drop from Devine looked like we could have ourselves a new champion until Douglas instinctively found his leg resting on the bottom rope. Devine tried but Douglas finally put Devine’s hopes to bed has he defeated his challenger to retain the title with Sean’s biggest fan looking gutted. Great main event between to rising prospects with Douglas standing out here, distracted by Devine’s fan, not at all, he took it in his stride and never broke character which would have been understandable as this match had added comedic value that made this a great end to a really good show.
So my night of kamikaze Pro Live ends and a slow walk home with my son on a cooler part of the evening and a smile on my face from what was an excellent night of entertainment. I messaged Kamikaze asking if a main roster show will be coming back to Collingwood and their response was more than pleasing as a double header is planned in August! If you have not seen a Kamikaze Pro show yet, Why Not?! An enjoyable way to spend an afternoon with also another shout out to Ring announcer Colin Russell-Ames who amazes me how he remembers some of the long ring entrances and nicknames that he has to remember and uses no bits of paper, just his memory has he adds to making these Kamikaze Pro Live shows just a great.
