Hello my name is Iwan Mackenzie and WILL PEOPLE GET OFF THEIR SEATS!
I’m back with another review this time with me making my return to PROGRESS in the Electric Ballroom in Camden.
This is my first PROGRESS show of 2019 and my first PROGRESS show since Unboxing at the end of 2018, I decided to give the first two shows of the year a miss as I have not as much invested interest in the PROGRESS product as I once was and the fans were putting me off as well. The reason I went to this show was because of the matches they announced prior to the show as they were intriguing enough to lure me back in plus March 31st is my 7 Year Anniversary since my first Indy show so I wanted to celebrate it in style!
So going into this show we knew that we’d get trilogy pieces to great tag team series as LAX faces #CCK and Aussie Open faces The Swords of Essex in a TLC match for the tag titles plus we’d be getting two Super Strong Style 16 qualifying matches.
Departing from Grove Park around 1pm with Leighton as well as my Mum and Nan in tow because it was Mothers day after all and they were going to explore Camden whilst Leighton and I head inside. We get to London Bridge and after a long tube journey to Camden which included a jazz interlude from a random stranger on the tube, I get to the queue and found that my mate Joe had saved us a spot in the queue meaning that we could get in sooner. We headed inside and pitched up on the right hand side of the ring with me and Leighton in second row due to our Gold tickets, we were originally standing tickets but my mates Ben and Trish were unfortunately unable to attend due to illness so I brought their Gold tickets from them and sold my standing tickets on Twickets so to get some money back from it.
As there was an hour and a half till the show I decided to roam around and scout out the merch area as there was a few t-shirts in particular that I was hoping to pick up; only a few wrestlers out in the first hour but I did get to speak to Kid Lykos and Angelico both of whom I haven’t seen in ages so I grabbed a picture with them, David Starr was out to sell merch as well as he had RevPro the same day so I was able to catch him, pick up his new Davey Wrestling 3/4 length t-shirt and grab a picture with him as well.
The final wrestlers out before the pre-show were the Swords of Essex so I went over to speak to Paul Robinson as I know him very well and I finally picked up his new t-shirt on the 7 year anniversary of seeing him wrestle for the first time and I grabbed my first ever picture with him and Will Ospreay as a team which is funny considering they’ve been one of my favorite teams since 2013.
Back to my seat I went and got treated to Gavyn doing the Bobby Gunns hip gyrations and Gadge get funky, it was time for the pre-show!
So in our Pre-Show match its a Frontline showcase as Malik, Joshua Joseph and Kam Lucia face off against Scotty Davis, Callum Newman and Nedeem.
A combo from each team take turn in exchanging moves, Nedeem and Joseph have a very grounded exchange with more technical wrestling before tagging in Newman and Lucia respectively who change things up entirely and go full on Lucha with a lightning quick exchange ending in a tope from Newman. Malik gets tagged in and just starts to murder Newman basically, loads of brutal chops and strikes from the Heavy Hitter; Malik and his partners stop the Newman’s team mates getting in so it appears Team Malik is going to be the heels of the match, during this a couple who came in late almost gets caught in the crossfire of Team Malik’s assault on Team Davis leading to me start the chant of “Should Have Turned Up Early, Should Have Turned Up Early nananan nanana!”
They continue to islolate Newman but he does fight back and tags in Davis who go’s to work on all three members of Team Malik and hits his famous Gator Rolls on all three members as well as some big suplex’s, Joseph takes him out but Nedeem gets back in and trades some heavy blows and takes Joshua out with a big old clothesline and shows some tremendous babyface fire. At one point they all just trade their moves on each other and I was like this is great as all of us in my section start chanting for Frontline. Newman looks to hit his Shooting Star Press but Malik gets his knees up and hits the Chutknee to pick up the win from his team to end a tremendously entertaining pre-show match.
This was a great way to showcase six new guys to to audience and I think all of them deserve a look in for the Natural Progression Series this year. If you want to check out the match for yourself then head to PROGRESS’s Facebook page where the whole match is available to watch for free.
After a bit more music we get the lights go down and instead of IDLES “Scum” being the prelude song we instead get CKY’s “Quite Bitter Beings” in tribute to the late great Kris Travis as this day was the 3 year anniversary of his untimely death. I’m going to get real with you readers here, this was quite hard for me on this day as Travis meant a lot to me when he was alive and even more now that he’s no longer with us, back in 2012 he was one of the names that kept me coming back time and time again as he was so tremendously entertaining with his partner Martin Kirby; I remember Travis and Marty Scrull having an awesome match in Sittingbourne years ago that still stands as one of the best I’ve ever seen. His cancer diagnosis was tragic and his death even more tragic, there’s not a day that goes by where I don’t think about him in some way and you better know that I was thinking of him on this day in particular, a few tears were shed. The crowd gave a standing ovation to this and chanted for Kris Travis’s nickname Trav as loudly as we could.
We then get Metalica’s “For Whom the Bell Tollls” to open the show proper and get our usual intro from co-owner Jim Smallman, he thanks the fans for standing and leads a touching tribute to Travis before lightning things up and talking about it being Mothers day and finds some mothers in the crowd in the form of Debra, Nick and Dawn. He then introduces Do Not Resuscitate who wants to address the ballroom crowd.
Lot of awkwardness at the beginning as the mic doesn’t work and even Present William Eaver’s mic doesn’t work either now admittedly this was hilarious because heels are getting mocked but the serious nature of the promo was lost. Jim sorted it and Spike then got to speak first of all asking where Debra is before saying “Fuck off Debra!” this killed me and Leighton; he then says he has a live mic and he’s louder than the fans leading to Gibson levels of heat whilst Spike tries to speak. The promo is basically saying how successful they’ve been since forming and being able to get rid of the old guard of PROGRESS before he heads over to Chuck Mambo who cuts a passionate heel promo about how he isn’t the fans friend at the bar because he won the World Cup and stole the show at Super Strong Style last year. He says that its a disgrace that their not in the tournament but says they will be at SSS16 as competitors and announce their facing Mark Andrews, Mark Haskins, Jimmy Havoc and Eddie Dennis before we get a familiar Welsh voice as Eddie Dennis interrupts them.
Eddie acknowledges that in this universe of PROGRESS that him and Mambo are enemies but outside of the PROGRESS universe that they are good friends and says that Mambo was their for him when Eddie got injured last week and checked on him everyday, he then tells a heartbreaking story about having to tell his girlfriend that they’re not going to America which was hard to hear.
Eddie reverts back to the PROGRESS universe and says that Mambo knows that he can’t wrestle at SSS16 and calls Mambo an arsehole. He announces that Haskins, Havoc and “even that skinny prick” Mark Andrews will be there before announcing his replacement for the match in the form of NXT UK’s Ligero! Ligero attacks DnR with a chair before cutting his first ever promo in a PROGRESS ring, he announces that it will be a No DQ match and that he’s bringing “He’s fucking Jeans!” This was a really good promo segment that despite the awkwardness at the beginning, worked for everybody. Mambo’s promo in particular was great, I still find it hard to boo him though.
In our first match of the main card its a Super Strong Style 16 Qualifyer as David Starr who has added the nickname of Sinclair Broadcasting’s Worst Nightmare after all the trouble his excellent promo on Twitter recently faces off against the new IWL champion Connor Mills (Read my review of IWL on this very website).
A hot opener here as it built very nicely over its 10 minute period. The bulk of the crowd were behind Starr and even though I cheered for him, I was fully behind Mills as I would love to see him in SSS16. Starr controls the first 1/3 of the match but Mills does fight back with some great kicks and hits his Springboard Asai Corkscrew Moonsault to the outside which I think is the turning point with the crowd as more people get behind Mills after this move. Mills hits a lovely MillsShot but it doesn’t earn him the win, Starr hits several clubbing blows which looks menacing and brutal but Mills does fight back with some hard strikes of his own.
In the end though, Starr hits the Death Starr followed by the Package Fossil Driver to pick up the win and stamp his ticket to Super Strong Style 16. Really great match that was one of the best of the night overall.
Next up Kasey Owens makes her Ballroom debut as she faces off against Nina Samuels where Nina Samuels’s Fatal-4-Way match spot for the PROGRESS World Women’s championship at SSS16 Day 3; this all come about when Kasey pinned Nina in a six-women tag team match at the last show in Birmingham and Kasey proclaimed that she wanted to take Nina’s spot in the match instead of going for the empty spot.
I joked to Leighton that this match would go on second due to it being generally a joke amongst the fans, it still is a joke that the women’s divison in PROGRESS isn’t given enough respect unless its Toni Storm or Jinny, still not as bad as RevPro’s divison though.
A very good match here as expected when you have two talented wrestlers such as these two together, they have very good chemistry from their previous bouts in places like EVE, it was funny to see the heel and face roles reversed. Nina controls the majority of the opening but Kasey uses her craftiness to gain the advantage by attacking Nina on the outside, rolling her back in and laying in her signature knee strikes. It looks like Kasey is going to win after hitting the Killing Joke knee but Nina narrowly’s kicks out.
What is a shame about this match is that the crowd seemed to be quiet which is a shame as the match was very good especially towards the ending strech. Nina picks up the win with the Primadonna to pick up the win and retain her spot in the match; I’m hoping that this isn’t the last we see see of Kasey in PROGRESS as she can offer something different to the division, Nina looked very good as a face and is the lead candidate for being the next PROGRESS Women’s champ.
There is a problem here though because we still don’t have the fourth competitor in the Fatal Four Way match at Super Strong Style 16 and with this being the last show until SSS16 and no shows over WrestleMania weekend, how are they going to determine the last spot? My theory is that a Storm may be brewing…
In our last match before the interval, we get the first of two epic tag team encounters as the #CCK combination of Chris Brookes and Jonathan Gresham accompanied by Kid Lykos and Earl Perkins the Staple Gun take on Santana and Ortiz of LAX in the trilogy ending match of an epic tag team series.
A bit of context behind this match: the first match happened on the American tour of PROGRESS in New York City last Summer and at the time was called the best tag team match in PROGRESS history and one of the best matches in PROGRESS history as well, I watched it and thought it was great but wasn’t sure about such high praise. The rematch came in Manchester last December and again was given very high praise, I watched this match and I thought it was better than the first match, I loved all of it and this got me very excited for this match.
We start off with some very crispy technical wrestling between Santana and Brookes with neither man gaining a clear advantage, Brookes tags in Gresham and Santana wants to tag in Ortiz but Ortiz says he can’t do it better than Santana but he evenutally gets in and starts mixing it up with Gresham, who I think is one of the best technical wrestlers in the world, people rank Zack Sabre Jr and Timothy Thatcher for example as the best but Gresham should be considered up there, he can just use his whole body as a weapon and the way he ties people up is genuinely great wrestling.
A big theme of the first third of this match was banter as all four of them had a lot of back and fourth back chat which was very funny and worked for this crowd. A go through a sequence where all four just flip for no reason and the crowd want Joel the ref to roll as well and Santana even says he wont get in until Joel flips, it looks like Joel is going to flip but Gresham cuts off Joel to big boo’s: LAX dispatch #CCK with a really cool tag team move which sends them to the outside as Joel gets to forward and back roll to a massive pop as LAX hoists him on their shoulders.
#CCK get back in and from here on we just get some of the best tag team wrestling I’ve ever seen as both teams are hitting great tag team moves and they just look flawless, Ortiz just hits a falling splash from a standing position that just looks hilarious to be honest; Gresham does two things that should be noted as he hit an excellent suicide Dive to Santana on the outside and then a little later he staples both members of LAX in the head whilst Lykos distracts Joel. Gresham starts to focus on Ortiz’s knee which would become a factor in the ending of the match, so remember that; Gresham with a lot of leg locks and Brookes with some submissions on as well all trying to subdue Ortiz. Ortiz somehow manages to fight back and get Santana in who is like a house on fire with his great offence, he even hits a big moonsault press to Brookes and Lykos when Lykos tries to interfere. Gresham tries to square up to Santana and Santana says that the staple to the head “Really Fucking Hurt”, they have a great sequence of moves.
There is some more great tag team moves with Ortiz’s knee somehow still holding up despite the agony its taken but it is realistic in the context of the match. Brookes hits a big old dive to Santana on the outside whilst Gresham locks in the Figure Four Lock to Ortiz, they end up rolling to the outside whilst Brooke is way up the entrance way with Santana who he locks in the Calamari Catch Clutch, then we get to the finish which I have a lot to talk about…
So all four men are on the outside and Gresham and Ortiz are the legal members of their respective teams, Gresham takes the Figure Four off and gets back in the ring whilst Brookes keeps Santana at bay from helping his partner out. Ortiz fails to make the ten count and #CCK win by count out, huh?
Now my feelings are about this are mixed because it does make sense as a finish of a match and you rarely if ever see a match end by count out nowadays in this modern era of wrestling but as a final match in a trilogy, you want to go out with a bang and this just left me and the rest of the crowd quite deflated. It was an excellent nearly half hour long match with some of the best tag team wrestling you’re ever likely to see but the finish was quite deflating, I would recommend you watch this match though.
#CCK seem to revel in them winning in an unfavourable manor so does this mean that #CCK have just turned heel? It didn’t feel entirely certain. After the match LAX says they didn’t want the match to end that way and if #CCK want to get Lykos involved the the next time LAX are in the country then their bringing reinforcements in the form of the “baddest motherfuckers in the world”, I instantly thought of Konnan as he is their manager in Impact but after speaking to my mate Martin he theorised that it may be Eddie Kingston which would make more sense if they wanted to do a six-man tag team match.
Interval now, and I grabbed pictures and spoke to Lucky Kid (was finally able to grab his new t-shirt as well), Eddie Dennis, Kasey Owens and Drew Parker. Thank you to all of them for being super cool as always, always appreciate chatting with them.
Back from our interval and we have TK Cooper accompanied by his South Pacific Power Trip colleague NIWA takes on Angelico; I would like to say that out of all the custom PROGRESS theme’s, TK’s has got to be the worst, it pales so much in comparison to “Keep it 100”, Angelico’s is pretty decent but still no “Bangarang”.
A pretty good match overall, with the in-ring work being good for the whole match, what I didn’t like about this match though was the amount of NIWA interference, I get that PROGRESS wants to get the new version of the SPPT over as a dominant faction but TK should have had this match for himself and proved why he’s one of the best in the UK, the NIWA interference took that away for me personally. The other thing that I didn’t like was the crowd just not caring in the slightest, really takes away from the match for me; they just seem to get Angelico and I know he’s quite a Marmite wrestler for a lot of people but I actually like him and think he can offer something different to a show, it may be to do with fact that he dosen’t just do flips and actually wrestles which is what the diversity of the Lucha Libre style is about.
A couple of moments I want to mention is my mate Helen getting in the crossfire of a dive as Angelico hit a running dropkick out of the ring which sent NIWA and TK hurtling towards where Helen was sat in the front row, fair play to her it was one of the best bumps I’ve seen in 2019 so far; the other move I want to mention is the Omulette De Frommage from TK onto Angelico, I love that move so much. Anyways TK picks up the win when NIWA runs in behind the refs back and hits the PowerBreaker followed by TK hitting a Phoenix splash to pick up the win.
We then had referee Joel who is referred to Big Strong Joel by the fans hitting a big muscular pose leading to me and my mates chanting for Joel’s guns in the style of the Bobby Gunns chant, I may have killed Joe with that.
In our penultimate match of the night we have our other Super Strong Style 16 Qualifier as 16 Carat Gold winner Lucky Kid take on the debuting Tristian Archer who most people will know from competing in the WWE Cruiserweight Classic a couple of years ago, I never watched him there or before so I’m experiencing him for the first time.
Archer is booed heavily by the crowd after being announced from Paris, France which was funny, Lucky of course is mega popular here due to his prior appearances in UK promotions like Fight Club: Pro, Riptide, Kamikaze Pro just to name a few as well as his wXw career which has made him a star. What this match did well was being a showcase for Lucky as he showed off his character work as well as his wrestling ability which sometimes gets overshadowed, but unfortunately that’s the only thing I only really enjoyed about the match well that and chanting for Lucky Kid in the style of Kyle Minogue “I should be so Lucky”.
The big problem I had with this match was mostly down to Tristian Archer who controlled large portions of this match and didn’t really do anything memorable with it, wasn’t my cup of tea personally; there was that and the fact that you knew who was going to win because it would look stupid if Lucky Kid can beat Timothy Thatcher, Axel Dieter Jr, Ilja Dragunov and WALTER to win 16 Carat and if he can’t even win a bloody qualifier then it would look stupid, I know every promotion is its own universe but wXw and PROGRESS are connected more than most. Lucky picks up the win via submission by way of the RISE lock to enter the Super Strong Style 16, unfortunately this was my least favourite match of the night.
Finally we have our main event as Aussie Open’s Kyle Fletcher and Mark Davis challenge Will Ospreay and Paul Robinson of the Swords of Essex for the PROGRESS Tag Team Championships in a Tables, Ladders and Chairs match.
Little history lesson for this match: Aussie Open put up their at the time Tag Team Championships against mystery opponents the Swords at Unboxing 3 back in December in a late MOTY in 2018, the Swords won that night becoming the new tag team champions after Ospreay used the tag belt on Fletcher; Aussie Open beat DnR back in January to get a rematch with the Swords in Febuary, The Swords once again won that match after using the tag belt on Davis this time. Davis got on the mic afterwards and said there’s not a goddamn chance that the feud was going to end there and announced that he was cashing in his Natural Progression Series winners shot to go after the tag belts but this time in a TLC match so Ospreay couldn’t use the tag belts to win. All of this was summed up perfectly in a top notch hype package by PROGRESS that you can watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KIwku-JfJkU
All four men are wearing jeans as this is being more presented as a street fight more than a wrestling match; The real story though is that Davis lost his luggage in Birmingham prior to this show and as a result had no merch, wrestling gear or even his contact lenses, I’m glad that he got himself sorted out before the match. Robinson was excellent in this insulting of the crowd during his entrance, one insult that I do have to mention is a guy by us who he said “If I looked like you, then I’d fucking top myself”, tremendous!
A big duelling chant for the two teams for the first 3-4 minutes as despite the Swords being presented as the heels of the story there are people who get behind them more than Aussie Open. Robinson does present the opening for both the Aussie’s just to leave because they don’t belong in the ring with him and Ospreay but Davis just boots him in the face leading to Fletcher and Davis teeing off on Ospreay, it all spills to the outside where Robinson takes out Fletcher and Ospreay tosses Davis into the crowd near us, I made sure that I pulled Leighton towards me fast as Davis came flying towards us, Ospreay then holds up a chair in front of Davis face as Robinson hits a running missile dropkick to take out Davis but Kyle hits a springboard somersault senton to a massive ovation as Fletcher looks like a megastar.
Fletcher rolls Ospreay back in but Robinson follows up and the Swords hits some pretty innovative tag moves that I’ve never seen before before Robinson scales Ospreay’s shoulders and tries to retrive the tag belts that way but Davis throws in a chair from the outside which knocks Robinson off of Ospreay’s shoulders.
Ospreay tries to use that same chair on Davis but Davis runs into the corner and then jumps up onto Ospreay and landing on him arse first thus crushing the chair onto Ospreay’s chest. The Aussie’s then go retrieve the first ladder of the match and grab it and start heading to the ring but Ospreay dropkicks the ladder into them before setting it up upside down before diving through the ladder thus sunset powerbombing Fletcher onto Davis in an insane spot. Robinson sets up the ladder and starts to mount it but Fletcher comes in to stop Robinson but Robinson hits him with the ladder, Davis the comes in but Robinson does the same; Robinson sets the ladder down and goes for the classic Terry Funk spot of spinning round with the ladder on his head with the intention of taking both members of Aussie Open out but Aussie Open do the smart thing of holding back and letting Robinson tire himself out, before hoisting the ladder up with Robinson dangling above the them, Robinson jumps down but Aussie Open take him out with the ladder, Ospreay is back in and hits a backspring pele kick to the ladder which takes Aussie Open out which does get a big reaction but does lead Leighton to starting the chant of “Still a Cunt!” which does catch on to a degree.
The Swords take the fight into the crowd and starts laying waste to the chairs on the right hand side where the stage is which lead to the crowd having to stand in that section which did lead to problems later on where me and the rest of my section was situated as the people who were standing got on seats by them so they could get a better view whilst we could see diddly squat and led to chants for them to get down from their seats. I even ended up arguing with somebody in that section because we couldn’t see, I don’t normally do that at shows but in this instance it was justified as it was just selfish, this woman who I asked to get down said to me “Don’t be a Dick” which means nothing at PROGRESS now, Paul backed me up as well.
So rant over and back to the match. From what a friend relayed to me, tables got involved and we could see legs dangling in the air which I found out later due to Twitter that The Swords tried to double suplex Davis but Davis reversed it and tried to suplex him, the Swords block it so Davis fights back Ospreay throws a chair at him, I saw that. Ospreay is gloating at the top of the entrance way but you just see Fletcher creep up behind him and throws a ladder straight into Ospreay’s face thus living up to his Aussie Arrow nickname; Robinson dives off the entrance ramp onto both of Aussie Open and Robinson returns to the ring thus getting a massive pop as we can all finally see!
Robinson starts to head up but Fletcher rolls in and knocks him off but Robinson clubs him down and starts to head up again but Davis rolls in and takes Robinson out, he heads up but Robinson gets on his back and locks in a sleeper hold which seems to knock Davis out until Robinson bellows out the words “Stay down you fat Cunt” which fires Davis up and he starts to scale the ladder with Robinson on his back like if he was King Kong; Davis shifts Robinson into position and instructs Fletcher to get up and they hit a super version of their Tossing Cutter double team move. Davis climbs up the ladder but a bloody Ospreay comes in and clobbers him with a chair and throws the chair at Fletcher; Ospreay climbs up but Davis meets him at the top and they just start to headbutt each other, a sickening spot which is quite uncomfortable to watch, Ospreay is able to knock Davis off the ladder but Fletcher pushes the ladder off but Ospreay is able to land on the ropes and hit the OsCutter which was very impressive and leads to the second chant of “Still a Cunt”.
Ospreay sets the ladder back up and scales right to the top and grabs the belts but Davis gets up and removes the ladder from underneath which leaves Ospreay dangling Jeff Hardy style above the ring, Fletcher sets a ladder up and scales it and dives off it taking Ospreay down in the process thus revoking memories of WrestleMania X-Seven. Fletcher grabs another ladder and brings in a table as well as Robinson rolls as back in as well but just gets beaten down with a well oiled Aussie Open, they set up the table in the middle of the ring, go to grab Robinson but he pulls out a baton and goes to town on Aussie Open, he taunts them but Davis catches him off a rebound with a pop-up to Robinson which sends him onto the table but not through it as the whole crowd starts to get nightmares about the Dennis/Andrews match at Wembley and the SDS/Riots match a couple of years ago with the tables not breaking but I still maintain that the tables wasn’t correctly positioned for Robinson to go fully through.
Ospreay gets in and tries to prevent Aussie Open from climbing the ladder but Aussie Open just beat the crap out of him and Davis grabs some chairs and sets them up in a seated position whilst also creating a ladder bridge on the other ladder; It looks like they’re going to give Ospreay the Fidget Spinner on the chairs but Ospreay fights them both off and scales the ladder, Fletcher scales up one side and Davis the other, Davis grabs Ospreay and hits some thunderous chops to the chest of Ospreay but Ospreay somehow manages to catch Davis and hit a Spanish Fly on Davis off the ladder bridge, just a couple of seconds later Robinson climbs over the ladders and hits a massive sunset powerbomb off the top of the ladder to Fletcher who goes down through the set-up chairs in a breathtaking one two punch of spots.
The Swords take Aussie Open to the outside again, yay more not being able to see; from what I get relayed back to me and from what I can partly see is that both Robinson and Ospreay hit 450 Splashes at the same time with the sound of a table breaking, they finally got good tables. The Swords looks to have the match won but Fletcher rolls in and tries to take them down with whatever energy he has left in a similar vein to what Ospreay had don prior, The Swords kick the crap out of him and put his head through a chair with Ospreay directing Robinson to hit him with a curb stomp but Davis rolls back in and covers himself over Fletcher in order to protect Fletcher in a brotherly display of love that I found quite touching; Ospreay takes his belt off and whips Davis’s back with it making some spine tingling noises, Ospreay chokes Davis out with his belt and makes him watch as Fletcher is destroyed but as Robinson goes for the curb stomp, Kyle gets back up and catches him with a powerbomb onto the chair as Ospreay looks like he’s seen a ghost.
Ospreay and Fletcher have an electric exchange which is the best moment these two have ever shared, Fletcher hits a massive sitout powerbomb onto Ospreay as the crowd go crazy, at this point they’re absolutely molten for this match. Robinson finally gets that Curb Stomp on Fletcher as he scales the ladder but instead of getting the titles it looks like he’ll hit a dive but Davis sneaks up behind him and hits the spot of the match as he grabs Robinson and drives him through the ladder bridge with a Piledriver which breaks the ladder and takes Robinson for good, it was an insane spot to see live, I lost my shit!
Fletcher screams at Davis to set up the ladders and grab the titles so they set up the ladders and start heading up but like a desperate man, Ospreay grabs both their feet and is just working off instinct by this point; Aussie Open just toys with him, they set up a table in the middle of the ladder and tell Ospreay to head up, so Ospreay heads up backwards and goes to grab the title but Fletcher grabs his arm and tucks it between Ospreay’s leg and Davis does the same and they send Ospreay crashing through the table with a super Fidget Spinner which is the nail in the coffin for Ospreay. Davis and Fletcher head up the ladders and grab the titles at the same time but Davis does it a bit to hard and the title falls to the ground which does look funny but Fletcher saves it with a ironic shrug. Your winners and new PROGRESS Tag Team Champions Aussie Open!
This has taken me a while to really think about it but this is my Match of the Year in any promotion anywhere, every spot was like a work of art and was so beautifully crafted. All four men played their roles to perfection in this match and they all looked like megastars, I would like to say that the MVP of the match was Will Ospreay, despite my views on his opinions and statements on Twitter you cannot deny that Ospreay is one of the best in the world and he’s one of the few that can get that old PROGRESS crowd reaction back again. I found out that this was Ospreay’s last PROGRESS match afterwards on Twitter, if so than thank you Will for so many great matches and being one of the most important figures in PROGRESS history. I urge anybody to watch this match if they get the chance because its one of the best in PROGRESS history, the best TLC match in PROGRESS history (that wasn’t a difficult bar to surpass), one of the best TLC matches I’ve ever seen and one of the best live matches I’ve seen.
Post-show, both Aussie Open and the Swords of Essex got a round of applause from me and my friends for their incredible efforts in that main event. I saw Aussie Open and was able to one of the first people to congratulate them on the win and just hugged them and said I was proud of them, it was quite an emotional moment for me as they’ve always been super cool with me and seem to take an interest in me as a person, that goes a long way with me. I also spoke to TK Cooper about ETM as well as it being my Graps Anniversary as he was interested in it, which was really cool of him, also grabbed a picture with all the guys I just mentioned.
So my overall thoughts on this show: it was a little rough around the sides and not totally perfect at times but I ended up enjoying myself and it was a good way to celebrate my 7 Year Grapsaversary. The second half almost killed the crowd but THAT main event saved it, LAX/CCK was a great match with a questionable finish and Mills vs Starr was a great opener, even the pre-show was great.
If you want to follow PROGRESS on Social Media then its @ThisIsProgress
If you want to follow me on Social Media then its @IwanMack
Thank you for Reading
Iwan Mackenzie
