A Conversation with Wrestle Crate UK's Richard Penaluna

 

We recently got the chance to talk to the man behind Wrestle Crate UK, Richard Penaluna. We originally spoke to Richard in September 2013 as part of our Five Questions with... interview series, back when he was editor of Calling Spots magazine, you find that interview here. In this interview we chat all about what's happened since our last interview, the creation of Wrestle Crate UK, what makes the product stand out in a crowded market, Richard's favourite people to work with and a whole lot more.  

ATPW: Same question as always to begin, what made you a wrestling fan? 

Richard Penaluna: It was either October or November 1997, I should know the date, and it was Badd Blood PPV. In Your House: Badd Blood, that was in particular. I'd seen bits of wrestling in the build up to this. I used to go to my Grandma house on a Saturday afternoon, there was nothing on the telly, so I would watch WWF Superstars, I wanna say. It was an hour recap show, they still have those hour recap shows now. So, I kind of watched that, but it was more in the background. Then my best friend at the time had gotten into wrestling a year before that and he used to collect WWF Magazine. So I used to flick through those magazines without really knowing what they were. I became interested by the characters, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin was just coming up and I remember reading a profile about this Texas Rattlesnake badass who was after the boss. I think that's why I've always had a soft spot for wrestling magazines.

Ultimately that lead to Badd Blood. Undertaker vs. Shawn Michaels, first ever Hell in a Cell match, to this day it's still my favourite match. That was the moment that I just fell in love with wrestling. That match was just superb. It was a mix of Undertaker, larger than life character, Shawn Michaels, just a regular bloke but completely flamboyant, athleticism and then this character Kane turns up. I remember being young and thinking "This isn't like anything I've ever seen before. It's not sport, it's not entertainment, it's somewhere in the middle and I love it!". I've been a wrestling fan ever since. 

ATPW: It's interesting that you mention the magazine. I find it interesting how many different ways people can get into the WWE product. I've spoken to people who've got into because of action figures, video games, there's just so many different ways that people have been drawn in!

RP: Yeah, that's a good point. One of my friends, his son is starting to get into wrestling. He's maybe six years old and he's getting into it through playing the WWE game on his Xbox. He got a trial or something, didn't buy the game, he just trialled it and enjoyed it. After that he started watching YouTube videos of people playing the game and he now watches that more than he watches actual WWE. Now he's started to collect the figures, he collects the Funko! Pops, but his way of getting into it was literally playing a demo of the game and then finding it on YouTube and watching YouTubers play the game and then he bought the game itself and that's what made him a fan. So I suppose you're right there's lots of different entry points. 

ATPW: In the previous about Calling Spots, you mentioned you'd wrote about wrestling before, so I was wondering when did you start writing about wrestling? And what made you want to write about wrestling? 

RP: That would have been 2007. Ten years ago. I don't know actually. I felt like I had a different ethos now. At that time you'd go on Twitter, you go on the internet blogs, not all blogs, but a lot of blogs, there was so many opinions ten years ago and even to this day, it was all just kind of negative and what wrong with RAW last week and armchair quarterbacks as the cliché goes. I just didn't enjoy reading that and I thought well "I feel like my opinion, is just that, it's my opinion, but my opinion is a lot more positive and when I have conversations with people about wrestling I talk to them because I enjoy it, so I'm not going to talk too much about the things I don't like unless it's particularly pertinent or relevant at that time. The majority of the conversations I want to have about wrestling are about the good stuff, the fun stuff". So I just started writing about that. The ethos was "Wrestling's fun, lets just enjoy it!" and that was the reason why because I felt like I could put something forward and it would just be an opinion piece of a random wrestling fan. I've got no external credentials that would entitle me to have that opinion, but I felt like I had an opinion that was positive and if people wanted to read positive stuff, I would be one of the people that was putting that positive thing out there. That was my goal at the time, ten years ago. 

ATPW: I like the positive aspect. Whenever I get reviews sent into me, they're either all positive or all negative. And I have to say "I can't put this up", because if you've only ever got bad things to say then there's nothing to compare anything to and vice versa. 

RP: Oh yeah, absolutely. I think you can be positive about wrestling without saying that every single thing is great. It's about the balance. It's like watching a bad movie, you can watch a bad movie and go "That was absolutely terrible movie, that was a bad movie, but you know what the way it was shot was excellent" or "That one character was fantastic" or "I really liked that scene". You can watch a movie a movie and say "that was terrible" but pick out something and talk about that's fine. You don't have to like everything, but when you talk about how bad it was, don't just talk about how bad it was, pick out something you did enjoy. Don't just shit on something for the sake of it.  

Relevant because Shit Movies.

ATPW: In between our last interview and the start of Wrestle Crate UK, what were up to? Just to fill the gap between the two interviews. 

RP: Calling Spots grew more than I thought it would. It was a fanzine and it still is, it's just nothing to do with me anymore. Calling Spots grew quite quickly, I guess to a level where we had a decent sized, quite ardent reader-base. That was really good, that was really positive. I thoroughly enjoyed being the editor of Calling Spots. As a hobby, it was great, I got to engage with the readers and the readers would take to different opinion pieces from all the writers and talk to us about it on social media. I used to enjoy generating buzz around the covers, I used to think back to records back in the day when the cover art was something unique and special and people used to take pride in that, so I put a lot of focus on the front cover and I used to love releasing them before the magazine.

I got to tick something off the bucket list, in between the interview in 2013 and starting Wrestle Crate UK in 2015, which was release a book. So we got to write basically Calling Spots: The Book, which was a compendium of the best articles from the first ten issues, but also I got to write about some of the experiences that the team and I had had through Calling Spots. So that was quite good, getting to release a book and having collectors want to own that and buy that so that was probably biggest thing that happened magazine wise.

Then through Calling Spots that's actually how I ended up running Wrestle Crate in the UK. So in 2015, I noticed the company Wrestle Crate in the US, I noticed their Twitter page pop up and I was like "Okay, lets keep an eye on this, this looks interesting" because I like merchandise, I like buying things physically and I like wrestling, obviously, it would be ridiculous if I didn't! So I was keeping a close eye on what they were doing and when I realised they were legit and they were recent boxes and seemed to grow a customer base reasonably quickly given they were the first of their kind in the world, the first wrestling themed subscription box, I reached out saying "This is what we do over here, this is the magazine and I've sent you some samples, here's what we're doing etc. etc." and basically set up a great working relationship with Ed who used to the owner of Wrestle Crate in the US, quite early on in Wrestle Crate's days. That relationship initially being just selling stuff, so "Do you want to buy some magazines?" and fairly quickly that turned into Calling Spots producing a bespoke product for Wrestle Crate. Limited edition versions of the magazine with different covers, artwork from the artists, things like that, so basically there was a Calling Spots presence in Wrestle Crate for six months, I would say. 

We actually worked on a pretty cool project where we worked with Rhyno. The owner of Wrestle Crate used to love trading cards, he used to collect baseball cards, stuff like that and that's a lot bigger in the States than it is over here, obviously. One of the things that they do a lot of in the trading card world, apparently it was new to me, is trading cards that have got a bit of relic, so a bit of match worn attire, like some cloth from a baseball shirt, that's built into the trading card. So we got to make these really cool Rhyno postcards but with that was a bit of Rhyno ring-worn attire, some of his wrestling gear, one of his old ECW t-shirts, things like that. It was quite a unique piece of merchandise, I'd never been involved in anything like that before. Working directly with a wrestler, also with an artist, also with the person buying it and then creating a product and getting it to them. That gave me a taste for it a little bit. So long story short that's how I went from being editor of Calling Spots to where we are in 2015 which was thinking about starting up Wrestle Crate UK.

ATPW: For anyone who isn't aware, can you let them know what Wrestle Crate UK is all about? 

RP: Wrestle Crate is the first ever in the World, monthly merchandise subscription service for wrestling fans. It's a mystery box of wrestling goodies that's sent to your door every single month and I know that sounds a bit catchphrasey, but that's what it is. We've got a team who handpick items, that's nowadays grown to the point where we create content that's actually exclusive to Wrestle Crate. You'll get a t-shirt in every single box, you'll get autographs, you'll get DVDs, you'll get collectibles, you'll get lapel pin badges, you'll get figures, Funko! Pop Vinyls. Basically, you'll get wrestling merchandise from all over the world. They'll be a couple of things that you could go into a shop and buy, the Funko! Pop Vinyls that sort of things, but what makes it unique is that we get to work directly with wrestlers, wrestling promotions to create content that you can't get elsewhere, t-shirts that you can't get elsewhere, the autographs, the print itself will be something unique that the wrestlers don't sell themselves, so even if you have that person autograph, you're not going to get a duplicate in your collection.

So basically, if you collect wrestling merchandise and if you spend money on wrestling merchandise every month, then if you sign up to Wrestle Crate, you'll pay less money and get a larger value than what you've paid box of wrestling merchandise. With the aim particularly being on good quality. I think we're at a point now, particularly in the UK with Wrestle Crate UK where we know who are audience is. Our audience is what I like to call the "modern wrestling fan". We're at a point now, in 2017, where there's sooo many flavours of wrestling, but wrestling fans know what they want and that's why you get people who are so passionate about supporting PROGRESS, people who are so passionate about supporting WWE and even TNA...Global Force Wrestling...I don't know what they're called these days...Impact fans, they will defend Impact because that's their particular flavour and that's what they love and you know what that's fantastic. As a wrestling fan, we are in the best time possible to enjoy wrestling, because we can get it easily and we can pick the flavour of wrestling that we want. So, with Wrestle Crate we get to sample all of these different flavours and bring a little piece. But ultimately, we know our fan base and we know the flavours that our fan base like the most and we will bend over backwards to get exclusive items that we know our fans will enjoy.

ATPW: Since Wrestle Crate launched, there's been a lot of similar products come out, different crates, different companies, in different forms, what makes Wrestle Crate stand out from the new pack?

RP: A couple of things. If you look at the wrestling subscription landscape, you've got there's a clear divide. There's some absolute garbage out there if I'm honest, there's some bad wrestling subscription boxes. There's some particularly niche wrestling subscription boxes and then there's the three front runners. 

So without naming names, you've got one that is very specifically, just for WWE fans, 100% for WWE fans, which is powered by Loot Crate. So, they know their audience which is clearly more collectibles, for lack of a better phrase. If you've ever bought Loot Crate, because Loot Crate as a company are the pinnacle of the subscription service, the founders of Loot Crate are geniuses, I've got the upmost respect for the people who started Loot Crate. But Loot Crate work with WWE and they have their own box and it's very like Loot Crate but with WWE stuff in it. So there's them. 

Then on the other side, there's a company who just work with independent wrestlers. That's it. That's their kind of business model because they already have contracts with these people, because they sell items for them already. 

Then there's Wrestle Crate, the original, who will give you the best of both worlds. We're in an advantageous position where we are able to curate officially licensed WWE products. For example next month's crate has officially licensed WWE products, last month's crate has officially licensed WWE products. But we also can work with anybody in the world that we want, we're not restricted by contracts. So we've worked with Ring of Honor directly this month, we've worked with the British Strong Style lads, who are absolutely on fire, we've had an exclusive agreement with PROGRESS Wrestling to produce items that you can't get anywhere else. So we're in a great position where we can offer customers a mix of every type, every flavours of wrestling in the World.

ATPW: It's great to have that mix. I think it's great that we're at a time where you find whatever you want for whatever you're into it...

RP: Yeah, you know what, if I just watched WWE, I wouldn't subscribe to Wrestle Crate, that's fine, that's not really our target audience. At the same time, if you don't watch any WWE at all, then that's probably not our target audience either. So those two particular niches, there's other option out there. This goes back to what I was saying before about understand our customer base. Our customer base is the modern wrestling who watches WWE, who watches RAW, SmackDown Live, NXT and enjoys that, but at the same time will go and watch PROGRESS, will go and watch ICW, will go and watch Fight Club: PRO in the UK and in Germany, because Germany is by far our second biggest customer base, so in Germany would go and watch wXw. That's our target market, the wrestling fans who do enjoy WWE, but also enjoy the different flavours that are a bit closer to home.

ATPW: It sounds like a pretty good way if you were someone who only watched WWE, but were looking for an in to other wrestling products, because sometimes it is difficult to know where to start, because there is so much out there. So perhaps Wrestle Crate could work as a sort of tester for someone like that.

RP: I'd like to think so. That's actually quite an interesting point. Something that we've done as a company over the last year, we get to work with the biggest wrestling companies outside of WWE in the world. To be able to create exclusive Ring of Honor merchandise, where you can't buy it on the Ring of Honor website, they won't sell it, but their team helps us make it and helps us market it and to me that's still mind-blowing. Ultimately, we get to create these different flavours and pull together premium items.

At the same time, something we've put an active effort into for the last year or so is working with smaller companies so not quite your Ring of Honor levels, not quite your PROGRESS levels, basically companies that aren't going to fit 1000, maybe 1500 people into a building, but companies that are slowly doing their own thing, creating their own unique way of doing things. Good companies, but companies that haven't yet made that break, that jump, to get to that Ring of Honor level, that PROGRESS level, that Fight Club: PRO level. What we've been doing is working with them for the last year, to say to those companies that "We'd love to work with you. Why not introduce your product to our subscriber base and show them what your product is?" and what that's allowed us to do is, in the last twelve crates or so, have a download. So you can download a free show or maybe access their on demand for a month to give Wrestle Crate subscribers, as you say, that taster of what these companies are. So it's not these premium items that you've paid for, but it's an extra bonus for being a Wrestle Crate subscriber. If you've been a Wrestle Crate subscriber for the last year, you would have got something like eight full wrestling shows, from all around the world, from Australia, from New Zealand, from Canada, from Germany, for free to download to your ipad or whatever. Then also on demand and things like that. That;s on top of everything that you get in there, the physical stuff. It's just bonus loot. 

Yeah, I do think there's definitely value in introducing wrestling fans to good wrestling, from around the world that they've potentially not come across yet. 

ATPW: Have you had any particular favour items that you've included in your boxes? Anything that you were particularly excited to send out to people? 

RP: Yeah, a few. I mean, genuinely, I tend to curate it all, I've got a team that I can bounce ideas off, but ultimately I like to plan it all out in my head and I've got this book that I carry around religiously so I can jot down ideas and stuff. I plan maybe three, four, five months in advance, so I can write down "Okay, we're doing that here, we're doing that there", so I can paint a picture of what the next few months are going to look like. So I can think "Are our fans getting enough of this? Are they getting enough of that?" We like to announce items each month, so I can plan in advance "This is this big announcement this month, people are going to excited to hear we're working with this person, so we can announce that next month". Those are the items that I get most excited about.

We recently worked with Marty Scurll, I really enjoyed that. Marty is just fantastic, so well-rounded, great in the ring, such a great character and I think the fact that his merchandise sells so well on Pro Wrestling Tees sums up his popularity. I think he's fantastic. So we worked with Marty, we got to make an exclusive print, which he hand signed and we got to make an exclusive Marty Scurll t-shirt, which again you couldn't get anywhere else. So I'd say they were some favourites. We have a Jimmy Havoc lapel pin badge this month and we've made it in the style of the old Hasbro WWF figures, which to me the concept of Jimmy Havoc the character as a Hasbro kids figure is just hilarious. That's a personal favourite, we've done pin badges for about a year now and this is my favourite, I love it. Early on we worked with Kurt Angle to get some signed prints, which was obviously really cool, because it's Kurt Angle! The British Strong Style lads, it was an absolute pleasure working with them, we got to do an exclusive t-shirt and an exclusive signed print. I think those are my favourite items, but if I'm honest it was more the people that we get to work with that make the items. The items are just a bi-product of working with a great wrestler and a good person.  

ATPW: Is there anyone left who you'd love to work with? 

RP: Let's not give too much away about what's potentially on the cards. I guess, Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart are two that would be just perfect for Wrestle Crate. I think, realistically we'll have, at least, one of those two in Wrestle Crate in the next month. Closer to home CCK are fantastic, Travis Banks is on fire. The beauty of British wrestling at the moment is we lose people, we lose Marty to Japan and America, we look like we're going be potentially losing Pete Dunne, Tyler Bate, obviously we lost Jack Gallagher and Noam Dar, but as we lose a fantastic wrestler, there's someone else who's coming through. The British wrestling scene is so good at the minute, although I've named CCK, Travis Banks, Martina the Session Moth is on fire at the minute. She's just taken off because people just get it. People look at her and go "Yes, I know what your character is and that is fantastic". I'd love to work with those three, so I'd love to work with those free but I'm sure that when we do hopefully get to work with the CCK lads, Travis Banks and Martina, six months down the line, if you ask me the same question, I'm sure the British scene being the way it is, I'll be able to give you three or five names of the next group of guys coming through. The guys and girls of the UK at the moment are just fantastic. 

ATPW: What wrestling have you watched recently? 

RP: I have to be very clever with how I consume wrestling these days, because time isn't something that I have a lot of. I still love it, I don't love it any less, but Wrestle Crate has grown to a point where, ultimately it's still a family run business, with me doing the creative and the day-to-day running of the company, the majority of that is just on me. I've got a fantastic team that I work with, so I've got a packing team and I've got an art team and I've got a curation team, but it's mostly me, so with that in mind, consuming wrestling isn't as easy as it was when I was editor of Calling Spots when I could stick the Network on all day and I could watch PROGRESS on Demand and I could watch the latest Ring of Honor iPPV and I could buy DVDs to watch. I just physically don't have that same level of time. So the way I consume wrestling has had to get cleverer, because I still need to stay on top of what's going on all over the world. I need to know what people are enjoying, even if it's not to my taste, because I've got an obligation to the Wrestle Crate subscribers to make sure it's not just one persons views and it's not just what I think is good, because that's selfish. A lot of the way I have to take in wrestling is through social media, through picking bits and bobs, if I'm honest.

So to answer you question, outside of WWE, because lets be honest I have to watch WWE, the last wrestling that I enjoyed and went out of my way to watch is a company that's quite local, in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and they're called NORTH and they've been on my to-watch-list for a year or nine months. Basically after that first show I was like "This looks interesting, I need to go and watch this and scout this and see what this is". So, it was half a mission, I guess, to go and check it out, see if we can work together, go and meet the owner, which I got to do, a really nice guy. On top of that it looked like a good wrestling product, it looked like they'd got to grips very quickly with understand what their audience was. Which was people who like wrestling, who want to go out, have a few drinks and a laugh and enjoy some...I don't want to say "Punk Rock Wrestling" because that's obviously another companies thing, but you can see the similarities, you can see the underground type feel that they've gone for. It's set in a nightclub. So that was the last wrestling, which was maybe a week or two weeks ago, that I went out of my way to watch. From that show, standouts were once again were Martina, "Flash" Morgan Webster who we've worked with before, but watching him do his thing in that intimate setting was really good and he was moved into the main event after there was a few dropouts, so that was really good to see "Flash" thrive in that, obviously he's having a hell of a year coming off of BOLA. El Ligero is just class. You can put El Ligero anywhere on the card, from the hot start, literally you can put El Ligero anywhere on the card and he will deliver. So yeah, NORTH Wrestling, first time I'd seen them, if you'd asked me a month ago I couldn't vouch for them, couldn't say anything about them, but genuinely really enjoyed it, they're definitely a company to keep an eye.

ATPW: Just to close up, where can people find Wrestle Crate UK online and anything else you've got to put out there? 

RP: Wrestle Crate is on Twitter @WrestleCrateUK. The same again for Facebook, just search Wrestle Crate UK. The website is WrestleCrate.co.uk. Have a look, if you're a wrestling fan, if you like me enjoy buying wrestling merchandise, t-shirts, autographs, DVDs, then I would love you to come check out what we're doing. We're a family run business, I'm a big advocate of supporting wrestlers and what they do, as a fan of wrestling, I'm conscious that wrestlers put their bodies and their livelihoods on the line to entertain us and I think that can often be understated. I feel like I'm in a really privileged position, where I'm the owner of a company who gets to work directly with wrestler to put some extra money into their pockets and to give something to our fans, it's like a win win for everybody. You get great merchandise, you know that indirectly you're supporting the wrestlers, whose product you get in that box. If you like mainstream wrestling too, you know you're going to get some WWE stuff in there as well. So if physical wrestling merchandise is your thing, then do check it out. We'd love to have you on board.

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A big thanks to Richard Penaluna for taking the time out to chat with us, we wish him and everyone at Wrestle Crate UK the very best. 

Interview by James Marston - Conducted 15th September 2017

WWE NXT #264 Review (Aired 7th September 2017)

On 7th September, WWE aired its 264th episode of NXT, taped at Full Sail University, Winter Park, Florida on 23rd August. The show's main event match would see the dastardly Hideo Itami take on the still employed and underused Kassius Ohno in a No Disqualifications Match but the true main event would be Asuka's emotional farewell to NXT after having her never-ending title run cut short by real-life injury. With an undercard formed of Sonya Deville taking on Mae Young Classic competitor Zeda, Lars Sullivan taking on a trio of tiny men & Andrade 'Cien' Almas getting some revenge on Cezar Bononi, it had a lot of potential as an hour of television but as always, was it any good?

Andrade 'Cien' Almas (w/Zelina Vega) def. Cezar Bononi

In a rematch from NXT #250, the two lads Lockup to begin with Almas powering the Brazilian to the corner, the ref calls for the break and Almas obliges but hits a thunder slap before stomping out Bononi in the corner, a snapmare takedown into a basement drop kick and more corner stomps follow, Bononi tries to fight back and takes a knee to the head for his effort, the two trade strikes, run the ropes and Almas goes into a pair of big clotheslines from Bononi, punches in the corner, a reverse atomic drop and a drop kick swing things back in Bononi's favour, Almas gets a moment of control and goes for a DDT but Bononi leverages into a pinfall for a 2. Shades of their first match here but Almas regains control with a stiff punch leading to a Rope hung GTR and some forearms in the corner, Almas is about to go for the corner double knees till Vega tells him to destroy him, hits the Hammerlock DDT for the pin. A nice, little match that continues to build Almas and Vega as something of a Latin American Rusev & Lana. The match itself wasn't much more than it needed to be but it was still smooth, hard-hitting and gave Bononi just enough in terms of hope spots to continue to build the big lad.

• General Manager William Regal isn't mincing words or pies right now as he calls out Adam Cole, Bobby Fish & Kyle O'Reilly (& Lars Sullivan probably) for being naughty boys and attacking people all over the shop and Regal wants it known that he only wants fighting to happen in the ring. Let's ignore that Team ROH's TakeOver attacks took place in the ring yeah?

• Itami and Ohno work out backstage before their match.

• The Velveteen Dream says something about, I dunno, Prince things. He's going to give a proper promo soon, or a match or just drop a fire mixtape. Who really knows?

Lars Sullivan def. A Trio of Tiny Men

Quick squash m8. Lars is presented with a tag team match but he says no, he wants all the meat, all at once. He immediately double clothesline two of the tiny men before choking the other to the corner and launching him across the ring, he then ragdolls the fuck out of the men throwing them about like (I don't have a reference here, help me, Mauro). After some corner splashes, he hits his big modified Uranage Slam on all three men for the pin. Solid big lad fun and Lars didn't even have to do a...

• Lars continues to do a murder post-match, all three men try to crawl away from the man that resembles a gigantic, bald, Sami Callihan clone injected with Bane Venom, until No Way Jose's music hits to a big reaction. He talks about how Lars attacked him back in Brooklyn interrupting the biggest conga line Barclays has ever seen and he wants to see Lars do the same now his back isn't turned. Jose throws fists but Lars takes over and hits big ol' crossface blows before hitting another slam finish on Jose. RIP Jose.

• Jonny Wrestling is at the PC being interviewed about Brooklyn and talks of how amazing it was for him and how he refuses to see Zelina Vega and her DIY T-Shirt as a distraction and owns his failures. Talking of failures, enter Riddick Moss & Tino Sabatelli who talk of how they consider themselves responsible for breaking up DIY and how they wanted Johnny to know he won't cut it as a singles guy. Johnny responds by saying he's glad they enjoyed the match from their sofa and that next week he'll take either of them on. Which would he prefer, doesn't matter he says. Savage words, Johnny m'lad.

• Hype reel for Sonya Deville, lots of TapOut gear & punching. She manages to get in her  'put your hair up and square up' catchphrase.

• SANitY recap from Team ROH attack last week. A video message from SANItY as recorded on Killian Dain's old flip-phone (Editor: Probs a Motorola Razr) plays. Eric Young talks about how he can respect Team ROH for doing things their own way but that he doesn't care for them or about them and especially not for them if they're going to beat up his gang. He only knows one thing and that thing according to Alexander Wolfe, is chaos!

Sonya Deville def. Zeda

Another quick squash m8. The commentary team put over both women's real combat backgrounds before Sonya Deville puts on about two minutes of controlled waistlocks, interrupted by Zeda leveraging into a pin for a 1 and some running the ropes. Deville gets back to waistlocks, Zeda escapes but runs into a modified spinebuster takedown knocking her out of the ring. Back in and Deville hits a roundhouse, a front strike and locks in a Triangle Choke for the pin. This felt like a faint variation on the match that Zeda and Shayna Baszler had in round one of the Mae Young Classic but Deville looked great & Zeda has such a distinctive look and enough charisma to suggest she's worth keeping around.

• Oney Lorcan and Danny Burch are friends now and as a result, beat up Marcel Barthel (the former Alex Dieter jr.) and a friend while Regal looks on like a proud dad. Ruby Riot comes up to Regal and requests a handicap match to shut up the iconic duo for good, Regal tells her he won't book that match but if she can find a partner, he'll give her a tag match. She agrees. So who could it be? Perhaps Dakota Kai, she's been excellent in the Mae Young Classic, she's already held tag gold with Riot back in their Heidi Lovelace/Evie days, she competed in a womens tag match at PROGRESS: New York the other week and two of the PROGRESS owners Jim Smallman and Glen Joseph could be seen in the back of shot during this segment. Still, with all that evidence it'll probably be Liv Morgan.

No DQ Match: Kassius Ohno def. Hideo Itami

Ohno's gear for the evening has gone for those Neville: Main Roster Debut colours. As the match starts, Itami immediately bails to the floor, Ohno follows, Itami back, Ohno follows again, Itami tries to go for a sneak attack off the rope but Ohno is refusing this and represents a brick wall that Itami runs into. Ohno follows up with a body slam, a leaping leg drop, a slap and a delayed vertical suplex for a 2 count. Running boot, during a second one, Itami reverses and sends Ohno flipping over the rope before taking out Ohno with a running forearm and slamming him into the post. Ohno commits fully to this bump and falls to the outside in a terrifying manner, out of the ring and Itami bashes Ohno off those steps before taunting on his prone arm. Back in the ring and Itami starts on, you guessed it, kicks, all the kicks, into the corner, kicks, hits a hesitation dropkick for a 2 count. Itami heads out to get a chair, slides it into to the ring, goes to pick it up but Ohno grabs it, a tug of war starts which Ohno wins, he throws the chair to Itami before going for a Rolling Elbow but Itami smashes the elbow in question with the chair to send the two lads to an ad break. Back from the ad break and Itami is taunting Ohno with a series of kicks to the head, Ohno begins to hulk up and tells Itami to kick him with his best shot, on his feet and Ohno goes for a big boot but Itami catches it so Ohno hits a leaping boot to the head, another leg drop, a shining wizard and a senton get Kassius back on track, on their feet and Ohno sets up for a neckbreaker but Itami snaps the arm, sets up for a GTS but Ohno slips out and hits his own GTS, a Firemans Carry Into a Rolling Elbow knocking Itami out of the ring. Itami crawls up the ramp away from Ohno who begins kicking a Itami and picks him up for an elbow, he wants Itami to know how much that hurts, a lot from the looks of it, Itami is back up again and Ohno goes for a suplex but Itami reverses into a fisherman's suplex, Itami gets Ohno in the corner and straps the chair to Ohno's face before hitting a shattering hesitation dropkick but takes too long getting to the pin so only gets a 2. He demands respect, Ohno hits a swift right to daze itami, Itami goes for a boot but Ohno catches it, Itami pokes him in the eyes before setting up the GTS, Ohno escapes and hits the low blow to end all low blocks before following up with a Rolling Elbow for the pin. This was some truly glorious nonsense. With less than 10 minutes, the two men manage to create something truly powerful and memorable with Ohno picking up his biggest victory since returning to NXT (yes, even more important than his match with Elias Samson). Credit must also go to Itami who has not only firmly settled into a very satisfying groove with his current heel run but gave the most beautiful performance as a man whose nads are in the most possible pain after that low blow. I can only imagine what could have been done had these two been given 5-10 extra minutes to create chaos. Elbows and kicks probably.

Thank You, Asuka

William Regal introduces Asuka who gets a hero's welcome as she comes to the ring in her fly-as-fuck suit. She talks of how she's been in NXT for nearly two years, has fought so many great superstars and loves NXT, she's grown so much and is so grateful for it. Regal talks of how he respects Asuka's determination to constantly defend her title and knows she'll go down in history as one of the greatest champions in WWE history. Others have started to notice how great she is and Regal has been discussing her move up to main roster with Kurt Angle and Daniel Bryan. Regal is sad to see her go but happy to watch the world discover that "no-one is ready for Asuka". The entire locker room come out to join in with the 'Thank You, Asuka" chants as Asuka grabs the mic declaring "you are NXT, I am NXT. Wherever I go, NXT comes with me". The crowd are on their feet. Ember Moon steps forward as her music hit, she goes to the ring, her music dies down and they face off, Moon extends her hand for shaking but as Asuka goes for it, she pulls a move from the Asuka playbook and slides it back before going in for a big, long hug, friendship is fucking beautiful. Finally out comes Triple H with his flowers lackey in tow, he takes her title and trades it for roses before putting over the 'undefeated, women's champion, the empress of tomorrow'. Asuka basks in the crowds adoration as the show goes off. I bet there were more than a few moist eyes in the house and at home during this one. You could say that this segment really undercut the move towards heel-dom that Asuka was taking but the truth is that this was such a show of respect and such an all-encompassing emotional event that it's hard to critique it. Asuka seems to be gone and that makes me sad, not just as someone who reviews NXT because it means I don't get to talk about her anymore but as someone who never really wants her streak to end. Treat her well, Main Roster, she deserves it.

ATPW Scale Rating: 7/10

A series of strong angles, some very good in-ring work from Itami, Ohno and Almas as well as the emotional farewell of Asuka led to one of the most cohesive episodes of NXT in a long time. That they were able to fit in so much, at such a breakneck speed and have it not feel overstuffed at only the standard one hour running time was impressive. Now let's watch as all this goodwill and positive momentum is squandered. Andrade Almas for NXT Champion, that is all, goodnight.

Article by Jozef Raczka (@NotJozefRaczka)

A Conversation with Discovery Wrestling Promoter Alan Smith (Recorded 8th August)

It's taken us a while to get this interview up, after illness and technical issues, but finally here's our interview with the co-promoter of Discovery Wrestling in Edinburgh, Alan Smith, originally recorded on the 8th August. I'm extremely happy with how this turned out and wish we could've got it to you sooner, hopefully you'll agree that it was worth the wait. Topics of discussion include getting into wrestling as a fan and a promoter, the birth of Discovery Wrestling, average show days, the concept of the Y Division and Chris Sabin's involvement, the next break out talent from Scotland and what's to come from the Edinburgh based promotion for the rest of 2017!

ATPW - When did you first get into pro wrestling as a fan and what was it that drew you to the art? 

Alan Smith - I was probably about six years old. That's probably going back to about 1988, would be the first time I can remember watching wrestling and I can remember watching it because my family had just had Sky TV put in and me and my brother were flicking through the TV channels for the first time and we ended up on a channel that had Hulk Hogan on it. Now I'd never watched wrestling before, but for some reason I knew who this person was. I can't explain it. We start watching it and it was Hulk Hogan giving an interview and it cut to an Ultimate Warrior segment and then my brother and myself were hooked from then on in. From age six onwards and I've never stopped watching it from when I was six, so probably going on about 28 years of non-stop watching wrestling. 

ATPW - I think it was those sorts of characters that tended to draw people in back then. It's interesting that you say you knew who Hulk Hogan was, before you saw Hulk Hogan. 

AS - It's one that I can't figure out, because it was so long ago, how I recognised him. I remember when I put on the TV channel, I referred to him as "There's that boxing guy", but I'm not sure if Rocky had been out yet, when he was Thunder Lips. I'm not sure if that was before, was that Rocky IV? Rocky III? Then it cut to Ultimate Warrior and I said "Woah, look at this guy! He's amazing!" Even though I hadn't seen any of the wrestling yet, I just came out with "This guy's amazing!" We just stuck with it from there. Growing up, I was more of a Hulk Hogan fan, my brother was more of an Ultimate Warrior fan. Yeah we just stuck with those characters, which is obviously what it was aimed at in those days, getting the kids to watch and it obviously worked! 

Source - Youtube.com

ATPW - When did you discover that there was a British or Scottish wrestling scene? 

AS - Probably about 15 years ago, 14 years ago. I'd started with the idea that I'd like to be a wrestler, going online and trying to find some wrestling schools. I tried, I live on the east coast of Scotland in Fife and the only school I could find was on the west coast, so it was a couple of hours to drive, it was eight hours of training and then a couple hours to drive home. I had a friend with me, but my friend quit after the first training session. He didn't like it, he didn't want to do it, because he was too sore the next day. I'd gone back the following week and realised that driving that way by yourself and whatnot, I wasn't really committed to it at that point, so I gave up, far too easily. I went back to it a couple of years later at another training school, which was closer to me and again I didn't really gel, it didn't feel right at that training school. Then it was probably another couple of years after that when I got involved in a promotion for a few years, before going my own way, doing what I'm doing now. 

ATPW - How did you form Discovery Wrestling? 

AS - Being part of the other promotion and getting to the point where I was heavily involved in helping run that promotion for a while and realised actually there's a lot of ideas that I have and there's a lot of things that I think should be done a certain way or using certain folk and rather than impose my will on a business, it was a case of "Why don't I do this for myself?". There was another chap in the same promotion and he had the same ideas and actually the whole idea of Discovery came together because I'd been through quite a tough time personally and Alex, who's my business partner, he had just lost his Dad, so we were both going through a bit of a tough period. We'd actually just meet up and of all things just sit and have a cup of tea. Just have a cup of tea and talk about wrestling and say "Wouldn't it be cool if things worked like this?" or "Wouldn't it be cool if things were done like this?" or "Wouldn't it be cool if you had this and you did this?" and just from those meet ups and helping each other through a tough time, Discovery was formed between us. Just the idea and how we'd want a promotion to look and work, that's how it was born.

ATPW - Does Discovery have a certain ethos or a mission statement? What could someone expect if they came to a Discovery show? 

AS - Ultimately, if we're involved in wrestling and putting events on, we're fans of wrestling as well, otherwise why are you involved if you don't have the passion for it? My whole thing was if this show that we're putting on, for example, was on the other side of Scotland, would I pay? Would I travel? Would I go and see it? So the shows that we put on are shows that I would be happy to pay to go and see. You know, I'm a 34 year old man and obviously I've been a fan all my life, but it's about putting on shows that keep adults interesting without having to go down the route of saying we're an over 18's promotion. It's about putting on great quality wrestling and matches, because I think ultimately, kids will love wrestling no matter what, because they're going out and they're going to see something exciting and the matches are so exciting. But what captures adults attention and what keeps them interested and keep coming back. So it's about, yes we are a family friendly promotion, but it's not dumbing the promotion way down and it's not all these wacky storylines and wacky characters, but it's also something that adults can appreciate with the quality of the wrestling. 

When we launched just over three years ago, we referred to ourselves as being Generation Y, because Generation X that's your baby boomers, but Generation Y is the next generation that came along. It's the people that have grown up with social networking, social media and mobile phones, so Generation Y is aged from probably about 14 upwards now. So really, we're a promotion that's geared towards your fourteen and overs. 

Credit - Discovery Wrestling

ATPW - Could you talk us through an average show day for Discovery? What would you be up to on the day of a show? 

AS - I kind of do everything. Show days are my most stressful days, usually. Just because there's so much to do. We're putting on these massive shows, but we are a very small team. So my day would probably involved, in the morning, picking up talent. If we've got international talent coming in, I'll personally do the airport run, meet them at the airport, make sure everything's fine and get them settled into Edinburgh. I'll be at the venue, I'll be making sure that everyone's happy at the venue, that our ring crew has arrived and the ring's getting set up. Then it's just all hands on deck. When it comes time for showtime, I'll be doing production, pushing all the buttons, starting all the entrance videos and the music, giving guys the cue to get out there and get it done. Alex, he usually deals with all of the front of house things, he's doing the customer service, making sure that everyone's getting in and getting the right seats. Making sure the crowd are happy in that way, because that's a massive thing for us. It's one thing to put together a really strong card, but the other side of it is the customer satisfaction and it has to be every aspect. We've all been there as fans and turned up to a big event and there's confusion over who goes where with tickets and it can sometime take away from your experience of going to an event. Everything important to us, from the doors opening and making sure everyone gets in on time, there are no delays, that people know where they're going and getting the right seats, that there are enough seats for them and then once that's all done then we know they're going to be in for a good night because we really pack the cards. My job really is backstage making sure that all the wrestlers know what they're doing, when they're going out, their match time limits and making sure that they don't have any questions, because its all told to them. They can just relax and go out and put on a good match. 

ATPW - I think what you were saying about the front of house, can really make all the difference for a fan going to a show and you don't have to ask "Where am I sitting?" and you're not waiting half an hour, an hour to get into the show...

AS - I mean, I still go to shows and I still go to other independent shows here and there and the thing you find is, you need to make sure you've got enough people to look after your crowd, because that's the last thing you want, at the end of the night you've put on this amazing show, the wrestling's been great and you go online and you look at the comments from people and it's people saying "Great show but I never got my seat" or "I never got that" or "The show finished late and I had to leave early to catch my bus". All those little things, they bother me. It might sound a bit corny, if I know that one fan's going away unhappy because of one element of the show, that'll bug me until the next show, when we can get it totally right. I'm a bit OCD like that, a bit of a perfectionist. From the moment that somebodies bought a ticket, who's paid to come and see a show that you're putting on, from the moment that they turn up at that front door, they need to be looked after. 

Credit - David James Wilson/Discovery Wrestling

ATPW - I wanted to talk a little about the Y Division Championship, because it's got an interesting history, but first can you explain the idea behind the division and where that came from? 

AS - Originally, we thought "We're going to start with a championship belt and we're going to add division to it". We were looking at other promotions and thinking "We'll have a heavyweight champion, we'll have this division, we'll have a Women's division, we'll have a tag team championship" and then as this got started we don't have a show every month, we don't put on two shows a month, we put on maybe seven or eight events in a year. So that limits what you can do with championships and titles. So we started the Y Division to start off because we're all about Generation Y, the big thing in the logo is the Y. So we thought we'll focus on the Y Division. The big thing was going to be focused on your Cruisers really, technical, fast-paced guys and we opened it right up, because it was getting a good reputation. I'm obviously biased, but the Y Division Championship belt is one of the most beautiful belts out there. So we thought the focus should be on this. Yeah, we called it the Y Division, but lets not break everyone up into divisions and not say "You're a heavyweight so you're only going to get Heavyweight Championship matches", "You're in this category so you're only going to get those" because we've got such a great mix of talent on our roster and it doesn't matter if someone's a heavyweight or someone would be considered a cruiser. They can still go in together and have an awesome match, it doesn't matter about their weight classes. So we focused on having a Y Division Championship and it's only now that we're starting to add championships to Discovery, but I don't think we'll ever have one that's focused on a weight class. From next month we'll have our Women's Championship, as well to add to the Y Division. 

ATPW - The first champion was Chris Sabin, what was the situation surrounding that? Because it got a little bit complicated

AS - It was certainly complicated. Chris Sabin was part of our first ever show, everybody knows what a great talent Chris Sabin is and he came in and did our first show, despite us being new. Lots of wrestlers will obviously be very hesitant if there's a brand new promotion saying "Hey look, we're just starting and we want you to be on our first show and we want you to come all the way over from America". Of course they can just say "We don't know who you are, you've got no reputation, I'm not going to do this", but we had a chat with him and he was cool, he came over and did our first show and was such a hit with the fans and he was great to deal with. So we decided we were going to keep bringing him back and wanted to build a roster around these types of guys. The decision was made and he won the Y Division Championship after a short tournament that we had. Unfortunately, shortly after he won the championship, it must have been about a month later, he suffered a very serious injury. It kept him out of wrestling completely for months, it could have been between nine months and a year that he was out. We thought, because we weren't sure how serious the injury was, "We'll keep the championship on him for now, we won't strip him of it and we'll give him the chance to come back and defend it". But it got to the point where we knew his lay off was going to be a bit more long term, so we thought "We'll crown and interim Y Division Champion" and then as soon as Sabin was fit to wrestle, we could bring him back and we could have a unification match, but unfortunately that didn't happen. He has been fit since, but our dates always seem to clash with Ring of Honor dates and he's always on those shows, but we were desperately trying to bring him back. But the decision was made November of last year, because Lewis Girvan had been the Interim Y Division Champion for a year, "it's been a year now, let's now make it official that Lewis is Y Division Champion". When dates match up, Chris Sabin is going to be back and he's going to be getting a title shot as soon as we're able to bring him back to Edinburgh. 

Source - Internet Wrestling Database

ATPW - So hopefully out of that difficult situation, you've got a potential "moment" when Sabin returns and challenges Lewis Girvan, that will mean something to long-term fans of the promotion. 

AS - Yeah. Anytime we put out there "We've got a special guest coming on this date" or "Who would you like to see?", the number of people who say "Chris Sabin, he's due his Y Division championship shot", it's great to see now that we're at the point, just about to celebrate our third anniversary, where people care about what we do, it's not just suggesting it for the sake of suggesting it, people actually care about what matches take place and who gets the title shots. It shows that we must be doing something right because lets face it people give a shit about what we do! 

ATPW - Yeah, the way that British wrestling is at the moment, people don't have to part with their money, unless it's something they care about!

AS - Plus there's so much choice in wrestling. The number of promotions in Scotland alone, for example, people are spoilt for choice. Every corner of Scotland has something, so they can choose. So if we've got to the point where people care about us and want to keep coming back, we're doing something right and this year was the first year where we had season passes for our Edinburgh events. There was such a great take up of that and we've already got our dates together for 2018 and people are already asking us when do season passes go on sale! It's great that we're building a proper loyal fanbase now. 

ATPW - It surprised me when promotions started doing season tickets, that it was something that hadn't really been used in wrestling before, despite existing elsewhere in similar fields. 

AS - I think, it might be a thing of depending on how organised promotions are with their dates in advance. Certainly for us in our first year, we were still trying out different venues and finding which ones worked for us or didn't work for us. So this year has been the first year where we've been able to. We're half way through 2017 so it was probably this time last year where I would've had all our 2017 dates sorted. But for the first couple of years, we were on a show by show basis, it wasn't organised that far ahead. I think that might be the same for a lot of promotions, so they probably couldn't put season passes on sale, while they were going "We've got a couple of shows planned, we might have one here we might have one there", but I think now, promotions have found the venues they like to use, they get their dates so far in advance and we're the same. I think that's probably why season passes have taken a while to come about. It's been amazing to see how well they've done at other promotions and that obviously influenced us in doing the same thing.  

Credit - David James Wilson/Discovery Wrestling

ATPW - You tend to use, at least one imported talent on each of your cards, what goes into who you pick to attempt to get involved in a Discovery show? 

AS - I think to start off with, it was a case of, everyone's got their idea of who is the one that people want to see. I think as we've found our groove, it's been more about who compliments what we do? Who embodies the events that we're trying to put on? Secondly, we work with a number of other UK promotions who lets us know "Hey, we're bringing in so and so, if you've got a show on this date, would you like them to be on your show as well?" So there's a good bit of work going on with other promotions when it comes to international talent. We know now, that we've really found the groove, what the Discovery audience wants. For example, a couple of months ago having Matt Riddle here and going one on one with Mikey Whiplash. Matt Riddle is that kind of talent. You're looking at talent that regularly run with perhaps, PWG or Ring of Honor. These kind of guys we know are the wrestlers that our fans want to see. Not only do we approach them, but we get approached very regularly now. That's the big difference from where we are and where we were when we first started out, when it was like "Are these guys any good? Will I take a booking there or not?". Three years later we've built up a good reputation, not just with the fans, but with the wrestlers themselves who know that when they're going to come to Discovery they're going to be treated really well. They're going to be in a good venue, they're going to be in front of great crowds and they want to be a part of it now. So we get approached by them fairly regularly saying "I'm going to be in Europe between this date and this date, do you have a show?". So that tends to be how we go about it now! 

ATPW - Have you got any particular favourites that you've bought in, whether that be their performances in the ring or how their personalities backstage? 

AS - We've been pretty fortunate that most, I guess all, of the people that we've had with us have been really good to work with and that's not the case with a lot of promotions, sometimes they'll bring in a guy and they're not that pleasant for whatever reason. But we've been blessed, I guess, with the guys that we've bought in. Matt Riddle was so laid back and was just "go with the flow". Then you've got guys like Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks, who we had here in April. Going out to have something to eat with Kenny Omega the night before the show and just talking video games, for example. Sometimes, it feels pretty surreal. It's been great to have these guys come in and enjoy their time in Edinburgh to the point where they keep coming back. Obviously, Chris Sabin been over her quite a lot. War Machine [Hanson & Raymond Rowe], they look the meanest guys on the planet, they look so tough, but they're so friendly and we loved having them in August last year. We're so desperate to get them back on a show for us as well, but the dates just never match up. They did a show in Glasgow recently and they got in touch with me to say "We've got a day off, can we come through to Edinburgh? We just want to do some sightseeing" so I said "Of course, yes". So just going out and sightseeing with War Machine in Edinburgh. You get on a good, friendly rapport with guys, so we've been really fortunate in that way. But in times of overall favourite, I'm not sure who I would put on the top of that. 

Source - Twitter/@PENTAELZEROM

ATPW - Is there anyone who you'd like to bring in, perhaps someone you've tried to get in the past but it hasn't worked out? 

AS - There's loads. There's a massive list for me! Where to start? Where should I start with this? We've got a fans page on Facebook and we're always saying "Who do you want to see?" and it's always the same names that keep coming up.

For a couple of years it was "Bring Kenny Omega" "We Want Kenny Omega" "We Want Kenny Omega" "We Want Kenny Omega" and it was like "We're trying to get Kenny Omega. Don't worry. We're trying" and then that came off in April, which was amazing. It was one of these that was totally out of the blue. We'd been planning for our September anniversary show and thinking "Who can we get?" and we're in contact with the Young Bucks a fair bit and trying to maybe see what could work in September. And then all of a sudden, they approached us and said "We want to do a UK tour in April. Would you do the Scottish leg for us", we were like "Yeah sure, no problem". They said "There's only one condition, we have to bring a third person", we said "Who's that?"..."Oh it's Kenny Omega" and we're like "Yeah, no problem that's totally fine". So we were delighted that we could bring those guys in. 

I'd love to see Penta el Zero M, guys like Jeff Cobb and Cody Rhodes. We've spoken with a lot of these guys in the past and it's all just about getting dates, because obviously they've got so many dates. Keith Lee, we're always looking at whose taken over online, whose the internet going a bit mad for right now and being like "OK lets bring them in and see what they can do here as well!". There's so many, the list is huge. My ultimate though, I would love to have the Motor City Machine Guns. We're desperate to have Chris Sabin back and he is probably bugged out with the amount of times I've asked him "Next time you come over, can you bring Alex Shelley as well?". I think for me at the moment, because we've had Chris Sabin here so often and we've had the Young Bucks here, if we could somehow bring the Motor City Machine Guns here into Discovery, I think that would be a huge coup for us. 

ATPW -  We've seen a couple of Discovery regulars head to television products like WWE's NXT, with Big Damo now working as Killian Dane, is there anyone on your regular roster at the moment that you think could be the next one to step up? 

AS - It's hard to look past Joe Coffey. The guys just doing everything right and you've got think it's just a matter of time. He's doing so well, not just in Discovery, but at so many promotions across the UK. He's been our top billing guy since we've start, between him and Lewis Girvan have been in the main events since the start. A lot of the international guys we've brought in, Coffey's had those matches and they've been insane. They've just been incredible matches. He's had two matches with Chris Hero, he's had a match with Jay Lethal which was for the Ring of Honor Heavyweight Championship, the first time the Ring of Honor heavyweight Championship had been defended in Scotland, so we had that match, we had him up against Tommaso Ciampa as well. So all these guys that you look at, Chris Hero is now Kassius Ohno in NXT, Tommaso Ciampa that was his last independent weekend. Coffey's wrestled all these guys who've now taken over NXT, you've just got to think it's only a matter of time. Where is the offer for Joe Coffey? Because he is that good. Every match he's had with us, since the start, has been first class and I'm sure that's the same wherever he goes. So I think Joe Coffey has to be the next guy to make that leap from us.

Then we've got so many others in Discovery. Lewis Girvan feels like he's been on the scene for years and years and years. He's only 22, but it seems like he's been around forever. There's no shortage of people that could potential make that jump. 

Credit - David James Wilson/Discovery Wrestling

ATPW - It's crazy now, that you can have so many shows running in the same country on the same night that have such a deep pools of talent to choose from! 

AS - There's talent that have maybe only done one or two shows for Discovery, that we've maybe only switched onto this year, like Chris Ridgeway. He's phenomenal and he's doing so well in so many promotions now. I just saw him tweeting a short time ago about how he's making his debut at this promotion and that promotion. Chris Ridgeway is another one that we rate very highly and think that he's got the tools to do something pretty special as well. 

ATPW - Chris Ridgeway is someone I've wanted to see again for a while...same with Lewis Girvan actually...

AS - Lewis is doing some great things with, he's been our Y Division Champion for close to two years, but forming this tag team with Aspen Faith. Aspen Faith is another one whose just got something very special about him. They call themselves the Kings of Catch and they're both amazing technical wrestlers but they're personalities alongside it. They're another one where we've had both of these guys in Discovery for a long time, but every time we announce the matches it's "Put the Kings of the Catch" "The Kings of Catch" "The Kings of Catch". So I think now those as a tag team, we're going to see a lot of them, in a lot of places over the next year. 

ATPW - Discovery's next show is 16th September, Year 3, can you let us know what you've got in store for that show? 

AS - This is our third anniversary and we're back at the Edinburgh Corn Exchange, which is a big venue. We've been there a few times in the past, they've got a small hall and a big hall, the main exchange, so we're back in the main exchange, where we had the Elite with us in April. We're hoping that we can have people come along and celebrate our third anniversary in style. It's gonna be the night where we crown our first ever Women's champion, so we've had tournament running this year, where women have been qualifying for a four way elimination match. The four way elimination match has been a staple of Discovery, whenever you go to a Discovery show there's a four way elimination match and that gave birth to the Y Division, so to speak. So it's going to be the first women's four way elimination match in Discovery and we're going to use that to crown the Women's Champion. We've got four completely different four completely different personalities in there, we've got "Session Moth" Martina, Sammii Jayne, Lucy Cole and Nina Samuels. So it's a great mix of talent. We've also got Lisa Marie Varon, who was Victoria in WWE and Tara in TNA, she's going to crown our first ever Women's champion. I thought that would be a nice touch for someone whose won Women's Championships in both WWE and TNA to be there and give legitimacy to our Women's championship in Discovery.

Matt Riddle is coming back as well, he'll be in action. We have a massive triple threat tag team match, we've got Polo Promotions against the New Age Kliq against the Kings of the North. Joe Hendry's going to be in action, Lewis Girvan will be defending his Y Division championship. We've had another tournament running this year, which has been the Hotter than Hell Invitational. We're back by a tattoo company in Edinburgh called Hotter than Hell Tattoo, so they wanted to get properly involved, so we had the tournament set up. The final is later in the year, but the two semi finals we've got on our Third anniversary show, Aspen Faith is going against Chris Ridgeway and Rampage Brown is going against Mikey Whiplash. So straight away the card is so stacked already. It's going to be pretty exciting. Hopefully it will show people how far we've come in three shorts years. It's the third anniversary but we keep going forward and we keep planning ahead. 

(Announced after this interview - ROH star Dalton Castle will face Joe Hendry, the House of Saynt vs. Michael Chase and two partners of his choosing and Mae Young Classic competitor Ayesha Raymond vs. Debbie Sharp) 

Tickets available here - https://shop.discoverywrestling.com/

Credit - Graeme K Cunningham Photography/Discovery Wrestling

ATPW - If someone had never seen Discovery, what matches would you pick out to show them to win them over to your product?

There are a few. I would send them to watch...there were three Joe Coffey matches from 2016. Joe Coffey vs. Tommaso Ciampa, Joe Coffey vs. Chris Hero and Joe Coffey vs. Jay Lethal. Then November last year there was Lewis Girvan v Marty Scurll, which was a phenomenal match. It was the same night we had Coffey vs. Ciampa and it was just incredible show from start to finish. This year we had the Elite with us, we had a big six man tag, we had BT Gunn, Joe Coffey & Lewis Girvan against Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks, but also on the same card we had Will Ospreay vs. Marty Scurll facing off against each other for the first time in Scotland. The whole of that card was exciting, even matches like Liam Slater vs. Joe Hendry and things like that. We had a lucha special as well where we had Shane Strickland, Angelica and Ricochet and that whole card will always stand out to me as being a belter of a show. The main event was and people kind of questioned us at the time, it was Ricochet vs. Big Damo, but it was something to behold. People were like "You can't put Ricochet in with Big Damo, what's Ricochet going to be able to do with a guy the size of Damo" but if you get the chance to go online and watch it, you'll be amazed. There was proper mark out moments for me, like Ricochet back suplexed Damo and even hit a spin-out powerbomb and you're thinking "How is that even possible? What is going on right now?" The fans were going crazy for it, they were going absolutely nuts.  

ATPW - I think that's something we don't see as often as we should, bigger guys mixing it up with smaller guys, produces a different dynamic...

AS - All cards have to have a mix of everything. You have to have a very layered card where it's not just six of the same matches, you have to give people variety. I think part of that variety is mixing up the weights and going "Okay, Big Damo vs. Ricochet!" Mix it up a bit and you get matches like that, which nobody would expect. 

ATPW - What are your short term and long terms goal with Discovery and pro wrestling in general? 

AS - Short term is obviously getting through our third anniversary. Hoping that we get a good turnout for it and people come out and celebrate it. That's definitely short term. We know what we've got coming for the rest of 2017. We've got for November, Pete Dunne, Trent Seven and Tyler Bate are making their Discovery debuts. We've got a very special show in December (Interviewers Note - Announced as Discovery vs. Bullet Club with the Young Bucks, Cody and Marty Scurll). It's gonna be massive again and you'll see it all over social media. 

Then long term in 2018, we've got our shows locked down and it's just continuing to grow. We always start out saying "We'll do half a dozen shows a year" but we end up doing more shows than we plan for. A lot of the time, it's because talent say "Can we come and do a show?" like when The Elite get in touch with you and say "Can you put a date on for us in Scotland?", you say "Of course, we can!". Long term it's just continuing to grow, trying to continue to grow, you look at companies like PROGRESS who go "We've announced a show" and ten minutes later they've sold out that show. That's the kind of thing. You look at OTT and that's the same kind of thing as well. You look at these promotions and go "Wow, that's incredible, what an achievement to be able to do that". That's the kind of thing we want to achieve as well, to get people excited to where you can sell out a big show without really announcing anything. Just continuing to have a good quality product that you know people can depend on and they know they're always going to see something good as soon as you announce a show. 

We've got options again, certainly online. The way things have been going over the last couple of months we've got exciting prospects for streaming services. We currently have an on demand service, but we've had developments over other prospects, so hopefully we'll have some more exciting news on that soon as well. 

Source - Discovery Wrestling

ATPW - Do you still watch wrestling as fan? Is there anything you've been watching at the moment? 

AS - I must admit I don't watch as much as I'd like to, everyone knows that life's busy. I'm a fan of Ring of Honor, so I've been following a lot of what they've been doing, but apart from that and I'm probably in the minority here, I don't even have a subscription to the WWE Network, it kind of expired and I hadn't even realised that I hadn't been on the Network for months. You stay in touch with it, because so many of the people on my friends list are into wrestling, so you see them sharing videos and stories of what is going on. But I tend to just dip in and out of wrestling, in terms of watching it, because I'm so busy planning for what we're doing, that sometimes you forget that there's other wrestling going on! 

ATPW - Where can people find Discovery online, social media, tickets, etc? 

AS - Online, Facebook's your best bet, Facebook.com/DiscoveryWrestling. On Twitter, we are @DiscoWrestling, don't confuse us with Disco Inferno, especially after today! There's been so many people in the past who have said "You should bring Disco Inferno in for a show, because you're Disco Wrestling". I don't think so! If you want to watch what we do, there is some content on Youtube right now. We have our own on demand channel which is OD.DiscoveryWrestling.com, you can sign in, get a free two week trial and binge watch everything we've done over the last couple of years. Binge watch what we do, share it and tell people you enjoy. The ticket site is shop.DiscoveryWrestling.com

Interview conducted by James Marston (@IAmNotAlanDale)