12/28/2025

© PROGRESS

PROGRESS

“Chapter 187: VENDETTA 3” took place on 30th November at PROGRESS’ usual location, the Electric Ballroom in London. Three titles were defended on the show, with Diamond Eyes (Connor Mills & Nico Angelo), Rayne Leverkusen and Man Like DeReiss all holding onto their Tag Team, Women’s and World titles against Sunshine Machine (Chuck Mambo & TK Cooper), Emersyn Jayne and Tate Mayfairs respectively.

While “Chapter 188: Unboxing VIII: The Search For Socks” on 28th December is a mystery vortex show, there is one announced match as Tommy Tanner, who failed a shot at Man Like DeReiss’ PROGRESS Title at TNT Extreme Wrestling in Liverpool, takes on Dutch rising independent wrestler Ricky Sosa.

PROGRESS have announced all their Electric Ballroom dates for 2026: 25th January, 15th February, 29th March, 3rd and 4th May for the Super Strong Style 17 Tournament, 26th July, 31st August, 27th September, 25th October, 29th November and 30th December.

Will Kroos is defending the PROGRESS Atlas Title in NOAH at the Nippon Budokan on 1st January against Saxon Huxley.

© Chris Gannon

RevPro

Uprising 2025

14th December 2025
Vale Arena, Cardiff, UK
Watch On: RevPro on Demand
Review by Peter Edge

The show opener saw David Francisco and his new faction The New Sons of Southampton, which includes Josh James and Kelly Sixx, face the Welsh trio of Shane Hook, Tommy Vril and Josh Holly in a match that ended very prematurely with an out of nowhere small package from Josh Holly on Francisco. This certainly pleased the Welsh but seemed a perplexing booking decision considering how fresh the New S.O.S group is and how featured their feud with JJ Gale seemed to be.

One Called Manders beat Ricky Knight Jr. in a clunky match which wasn’t Manders’ fault. After Manders’ lariat got the 1-2-3, it was very notable how quickly RKJ left the ring, like he was Road Warrior Hawk in what turned out to be his final match in WWE in 2003 and which spurned his chances of getting the comeback run in the company that his tag partner got, or like when Austin Aries exited the ring immediately after losing the Impact World Title to Johnny Impact.

The Cruiserweight Title scramble match involving champ Joe Lando, his CPF teammate Danny Black, Lio Rush, Leon Cage, Robbie X and Will Kaven was the expected fare for this kind of match involving some fun wrestlers to watch (and also Will Kaven.) It was worked at a quick pace, lots of high-flying and lots of near-falls with a hot 2.99 involving Will Kaven that played heavily into the “go away” heat but Will would get his comeuppance by getting kicked in the nuts by Lando by after he delivered multiple low blows during the match and then taking the pin after Lando’s shooting star elbow. Kaven’s luck would continue to dissolve when interjecting himself into a post-match angle with Lando and Black and being met by a Lleyton Buzzard spear after Buzzard’s stint in commentary, where he hinted at going for the belt that Lando currently holds.

Anita Vaughan and Alex Windsor would meet with Alex’s feud with the new Cut Throat Collective continuing as Alex continues to go through the CTC gauntlet in her efforts to get her hands on the Collective’s leader Safire Reed.

Despite the commentary team of Dave Bradshaw and Andy Quildan tell the viewer that this is a different Anita Vaughan than her usual hyperactive demeanour in Rev Pro, her heel work and cerebral control segments is something that she has been working on in EVE and with Alex who is a fantastic babyface, it led to a good 7 minute match resulting in a DQ win for Alex after Anita was stuck in Windsor’s finishing Sharpshooter. I’m guessing Safire didn’t want her best friend to submit like her favourite all-time did 12 hours earlier.

The post match-angle saw Mercedes Blaze come out to choke Windsor with a chain before Nina Samuels made the save and cleaned house with her fellow deposed CTC teammate, striking an alliance with Windsor afterwards. Gotta say, seeing a babyface Nina is weird after her sterling work as heel champ in many UK promotions in the last few years.

Next up was a Trent Seven vs Mark Davis and because it’s a Trent Seven in Rev Pro in 2025, it went more than 15 minutes. This went longer than all but two other matches on the card (Mercedes vs Rhio and Oku vs Mills went longer) and it was also a 3.25 star match. Davis got the win after Kyle Fletcher injected himself, improving the match by quarter of a star by doing so, and hit two tornado piledrivers.

In the second worst bit of news to come from Sky News this week, Trent Seven is threatening to restart Fight Club Pro. Based on what I’ve seen from Trent in 2025 Rev Pro this might be the worst business decision to come out of Wolverhampton since Victor Pereira got a three year extension on his contract two months before he got sacked as Wolverhampton Wanderers manager.

The Young Guns eight defence of their Undisputed British Tag Titles against Greedy Souls (Danny Jones and Brendan White) was one of the more weaker ones of their reign so far. Whether it was because of the face/heel dynamic that was seen in the Wales vs rest of the world matches earlier and later on the card wasn’t as pronounced with the loyal fanbase of the champs, Luke Jacobs and Ethan Allen being present and making noise for their favourite wrestler. Brendan being knocked silly when missing moonsault also didn’t help the proceedings and despite Danny putting in a great shift in the final minutes, it couldn’t elevate the match from being just fine

Ricochet was always winning in his AEW National Title defence against Nino Bryant, unless Nino had signed a deal with All Elite Wrestling on the sly. Obvious outcome aside, the match achieved its desired cause with Nino looking great in the process of defeat. In a great match, Ricochet was flawless in his execution and Nino played a great underdog. The opening minutes did see spots revolving around Ricochet’s bald head including a slap to the top of the head in a comedy spot which was notable for Andy Quildan saying that Nino should be concentrating on the match because comedy spots frowned upon in Rev Pro. From there, the action got serious and a ****+ match broke out with a good finish seeing Ricochet using the referee to unbalance Nino while on the top rope and then hit his Spirit Gun to finally get the 1-2-3, after Nino had kicked out of all of Rico’s signature moves throughout the match including Vertigo. After the match, Ricochet extended the hand to Nino before kicking him in the dick in the funniest moment of the night, however unintentional it was.

Michael Oku vs Connor Mills was really good. It wasn’t a “Michael Oku epic” like we have been accustomed to in the last two years, instead going under twenty minutes with the story of the match seeing Connor work on the leg of Oku that had kept him out of action for two months with Oku needing surges of adrenaline to get through the match and hit his offence. The final minute was maybe my favourite stuff in the ring at this event with Oku potentially using his knee injury to stop the match and try to roll up a caught off-guard Mills but after a kick out, Mills tried to put on his ankle lock but Oku using leverage to put his former tag team partner into a backslide for the win.

The result surprised me as Rev Pro needs to push new guys to the front and Michael Oku has been a good guy to help that process. With the push of Leon Slater looking like it has obstacles in the way with WWE taking a shine to him through their dominant hold on TNA, as evidenced by Leon’s scheduled appearance in the main event of this show needing to be cancelled when WWE booked him to appear at John Cena’s ByeBye tapping out extravaganza. Rev Pro need someone who can be relied on not to be pulled from shows on a week before it was due to take place and Connor Mills, one of the Top 5 workers in the UK in 2025, would have benefited from a win against his career rival.

As much as Michael Oku has been the top worker in the country this year, you get the feeling that it is “leaving the territory” time for Oku with his AEW appearances in the final third of 2025, and the feeling that he has done everything he can here. An appearance at the end of the show tells you what Michael’s next month or two looks like. Maybe it’s to set up his UK ByeBye. Maybe Michael Oku will be the face of the Trent Seven project that was reported by Sky News. Without wanting to sound too harsh, as a Newcastle United fan, Michael is used to big money projects that are doomed to fail. 

© Chris Gannon

The semi-main event saw Mercedes Mone defend her title against one of the most travelled wrestlers in the UK women’s scene in Rhio. Whether or not an earlier announcement of a Mercedes match and her opponent for this match could have gotten more people who were in Cardiff for Collision to stay around is a debate for another day. What isn’t up for debate is that Mercedes is so good at making her opponents look great, even if they end up looking at the ceiling or tapping out, playing to her opponents strengths each time. While ranking the four defences so far would cause a fun chat, talk would also pivot to each of Kanji, Safire Reed, Emersyn Jayne and Rhio getting off the Mone train better than when they entered the station. While the 9.00+ (as I write this) on Cagematch is a little high in my opinion, I still have this Mercedes/Rhio match second below the Kanji match in Doncaster on Easter Sunday of this year.

Rhio would do something not many have done by kicking out of the Mone Maker with Mercedes herself kicking out of the Package Piledriver that is Rhio’s big move. Mercedes would escape with the win via a pinning combination, showing a defiant middle finger to the camera as she stood in the aisle.

Also, something of interest was that the Discovery Wrestling Women’s and EWA Ttile, based out of Austria were also on the line. Considering the previous champ, Emersyn defended the title three times in her 560 day reign before dropping the belt to Mercedes in Crystal Palace at Global Wars on Forbidden Door weekend and the Cardiff defence was the 19th defence in the eight year defence, where the Discovery Title goes in the lineage of the Undisputed British Title is something to put in the “Wait and See” column .

Going into 2026, of the titles outside the Tony-verse held by Mercedes, the one that had the biggest storyline attached to it was the Rev Pro belt, with Kanji feeling like the annoyed one for a while and her friendship with Mone feeling doomed. The obvious end-game looked to be Kanji and Mercedes at Wembley Arena, which makes the events that occurred in the Co-Op Arena days after the defense against Kanji seem bizarre when you look at the last eight months.

Mercedes Mone lost the Undisputed Title to Alex Windsor, on the hour of Collision in Manchester that wasn’t on Wednesday. While Alex having the title brings some impetus on the Safire vs CTC feud, the fact that the change came three days (six in AEW canon) after Mone’s defiant middle finger to the rest of the women’s roster raises questions, especially when considered alongside the man pushed as the “face of Rev Pro” Leon Slater being in a situation where he can be withdrawn at short notice by his WWE through their relationship with TNA.

It seems that lately Andy Quildan bets have fallen not even at the final hurdle.

The main event saw Cardiff’s own Jay Joshua challenge for the Undisputed Men’s British Title against Sha Samuels. Sha would be booed by the crowd with Sha leaning into it during the process, draped in the St. Georges flag looking like a lamppost in Birmingham in the process.

However you feel about the “North of Watford” expansion (hang on, is Cardiff actually north of Watford?) (Editor’s Note: it is not) and how it’s affected Sha’s reign with Samuels struggling to be as over in Coventry or Wolverhampton like he is in London at Rev Pro shows, the dynamic worked brilliantly on this afternoon with the crowd being fully behind JJ.

The early bits of the match were marred by a brawl outside the ring for multiple minutes before the match officially began, the third time it had happened during this show with RKJ vs Manders and the tag title match starting similarly in what is a wonderful endorsement for quality control when it comes to laying out matches (I really want to do a “damn it, D-Lo” joke like in OSW Review, but how many of you will get it)

Also, that brawl before the bell ring was marred by the fact that the viewer couldn’t see a thing because of lack of light shining on them as they brawled around the building making viewing impossible, I swear there was more light in a Haunted House Escape room than the Vale Arena during the brawl (and throughout the night according to eyewitness testimony)

But once the action got into the ring, a good match broke out but was surprisingly shorter than the usual Epic British Title match you come to expect from Rev Pro at 13 minutes and 49 seconds but in those 13:49, they packed a lot in an attempt to produce an epic.

Ref bumps, shenanigans with the title belt, kick outs from finishers and callback from their Lyon match in October all came before Joshua hit his Gotch Piledriver to win the match and title, ending the Sha Cinderella run with the main title which end being more a Hilary Duff adaption of the move than the classic Disney cartoon by the end of his 4 month reign.

A JJ celebration would end just as it got started as after Samuels did the sporting loser bit, maintaining his babyface status, One Called Manders entered the arena to make a non-verbal challenge to the new champ only to get ambushed by T.K Cooper and while the American and New Zealander had a pull-apart brawl, Michael Oku came out to make his declaration of a challenge known.

While the scene for the future was set by the challenges and a fun pull-apart brawl, it did overshadow the joyous scenes at least on the television coverage of the Uprising show.

There was a lot of good to great wrestling on this show with a very happy ending to close the four hour show (without an intermission) but it was something that after watching at home didn’t make me wish I had been in Cardiff and not at work on this Sunday afternoon. A friend who was there put it simply to me. “Everyone looked so tired when leaving the show”. This is after a joyous moment of a hometown hero winning the Rev Pro title and I see where my friend is coming from.

I’ve been to eight Rev Pro shows this year and all times except one, maybe two times, I’ve gone away with a sense of it was good but not feeling exhilarated like I have at wrestling shows like EVE: Riot Grrrls of Wrestling or even Kamikaze Pro shows. Rev Pro’s in-ring product is good, very exciting at times with lighting so dark in the arena that looks like it is honouring Ring of Honor in how dark it is, it just exhausts me. With a presentation with no levity at all, no wonder fans come away from shows “exhausted” and the fact it took me three sittings to get through “Uprising” tells you how long it feels. Even the movie “There Will Be Blood” had moments of levity, it’s wrestling for wrestling sakes and when there are no stories that grab the attention and yours truly waits to see if stars are on the card before getting a ticket, it tells that Revolution Pro needs to up their game on the presentation of their product in 2026.

RevPro News

The last RevPro show of the year will be held on 28th December at The 1865 in Southampton. Leon Cage faces Leland Bryant in singles action, Will Kaven takes on Leyton Buzzard, while CPF (Danny Black & Joe Lando) face Nino Bryant and Michael Oku.

RevPro has announced 2026 dates for appearances at Porchester Hall in London, The 1865 in Southampton, HMV Empire in Coventry, Network in Sheffield and the return of the Contenders show to Buckland Community Centre in Portsmouth.

© Chris Gannon

UK and Ireland

Pro-Wrestling EVE 142: “Let’s Slam Santa”

5th December 2025
The Big Penny Social, London, UK
Watch On: YouTube
Review by Peter Edge

On a day that EVE: Riot Grrrls of Wrestling put tickets for sale for their biggest event in their history at the O2 Indigo, the promotion put on their final show of 2025 at their home of the Big Penny Social in Walthamstow in North London, with one of the most famous alumni in their history Jamie Hayter, teaming with one of their most current popular stars Session Moth Martina, to face the current EVE Champion Rhio and one of the more underrated wrestlers in women’s wrestling in the UK, Alexxis Falcon.

But before the main event, the main draw of the “Let’s Slam Santa” show and the biggest attraction of the last 3 months was concluded, with three She-1 qualifiers to cement the 8-woman field for the annual tournament that will cross through the first two shows of the year in January and February.

Ok, let’s start with the best moment of the show, actually the best moment of the year in EVE, in my humble opinion.

If you are one of those people who thinks “wrestling shouldn’t be fun,” you’d have hated the first match out of intermission. I also wouldn’t like you.

Skye Smitson was booked to face either one of the Pretty Psycho team of Amira Blair and Zoe Lucas. It appeared that it was for Amira or Zoe to decide, but to quote the pair, “they are one entity, they will not choose” so it was for Will Ospreay, the head producer of EVE, to decide, and it turns out that all Will wanted to be since he was a kid was not to have the most five stars awarded by Dave Meltzer, but to be Simon Cowell, and he called for a rendition of “EVE’s Got Talent”. (Does this mean that, in canon, Ospreay-ism is basically talent shows?)

Zoe’s presentation was just to stand there and be “just a girl” which elicited “Holy Shit” and “That was awesome” chants which, while deserved because it’s Zoe Lucas, the vibes in the building were that Amira’s path to victory in EVE’s Got Talent was easier than an Australia run chase during this year’s Ashes, but did she ever chase that run total down.

Amira proceeded to play “You Raise Me Up” by Westlife using her nostrils as a flute accompanied by back up dancers who joined in with a dance number. It was something to behold and after Will Ospreay confirmed his desire to be Simon Cowell with a “I didn’t like it…I loved it!” Amira qualified for the qualifier and then proceeded to be hit with a Skye Smitson (who was in the background all throughout the talent show) lariat and lost the match in six seconds.

If you disregard the complete logic gap in all this (you’re telling me that Amira with 60 seconds notice managed to rustle up back up dancers and get people in the front row to throw streamers?), this was the most brilliant four minutes of live wrestling I’ve seen in 2025.

(I mean, wrestling as a concept is a logic gap (the Irish whip, people).

It was bonkers, nuts and funny, with a brilliant plot twist at the end of having Amira do all that just to lose in six seconds. One of the long-running gags of EVE is that nothing can go right for Amira and Zoe. They managed to win the tag titles via forfeit only to lose them half an hour later in a three-way elimination match, being eliminated first inside a minute on the early August show. Sometimes you need a fall guy (or gal), and Pretty Psycho are perfect for that role. If this is Ospreay-ism, then I’m sold.

© Chris Gannon

Joining Skye Smitson into the Elite Eight was Scotland’s Molly Spartan, who beat the scheduled Lucy Sky’s replacement (due to a knee injury picked up at TNT), Violet Nyte, in a good match. It was Molly’s maiden outing in EVE (and according to Cagematch her first match in London since that pandemic), but she got plenty of cheers from what sounded like a hefty amount of Northerners in the crowd.

Sorry, quick tangent, are all Northern wrestling fans as annoying as the ones I encountered at the show? There was a massive aloofness to them and one in particular wanted to be a main character and insisted on standing up throughout Rhio’s entrance, much to the delight of those behind him in the seated section that was not slanted up.

Molly looked every bit the star that she was hyped up to be from those in the know and her presence in the She-1 could very well not be an anomaly judging by “Let’s Slam Santa”.

Emi Sakura became the seventh (actually timeline wise it was the fifth because Emi vs Rayne Leverkusen was the first half’s final match but work with me) qualifier for the She-1, beating Rayne in a fun match.

A clash of the Queen of the ResGal, the former home of EVE and the hometown hero of EVE, Walthamstow’s Leverkusen made for an atmosphere that saw fans from ResGal days and newer fans behind Leverkusen. It was as good as you expect a match between two people with such good wrestling IQs to be, and even a slip up towards the end couldn’t prevent this from being an entertaining match.

So that is Emi Sakura, Molly Spartan, Skye Smitson, Anita Vaughan, Safire Reed, Session Moth Martina and Alexxis Falcon in the She-1 single elimination tournament to last the first two shows of the year with the winner to fac…..hang on, you say, that’s seven?

Well, after a very fun tag team title match between Lallie (Hollie Barlow and Lana Austin) against Nina Samuels and her assistant Abi Cartwright, which saw some fun comedy spots and moments that really make me want to watch Nina and Lana match up one time live, the bout ended on a very captivating pin package exchange between Hollie and Abi, which saw Hollie trap Abi for long enough to get the 1-2-3.

Post-match antics saw Nina state that she was now concentrating on singles action and stated that as last year’s winner, she didn’t need to qualify for the She-1 and that Abi had done the necessary admin to get her in the Elite Eight. Dann Read, the owner and matchmaker of EVE (Will got delegated the Skye/Pretty Psycho match in canon, I guess) came out with the bad news for Nina.

It turns out that Abi signed her name on the contract which meant that she is in the She-1 and not Nina, but because Abi has yet to win a singles match in EVE, she’ll need to negotiate a qualifier against a mystery opponent on the January show.

© Chris Gannon

The show would be bookended by a return appearance to EVE by VENY, in which she defeated Melissa Fierce in a fun opener, after which VENY could be easily be seen by expert lip readers to say “I’ll be back,” something she reiterated to me in conversation after the show and the tag main event.

A heated affair lived up to its hype from the outset, with a lock up with Hayter and Rhio going to the outside and into the “splash zone,” the seated section in which fans are advised when wrestlers are near to move like hell. In fact, there was a portion of the match which lasted a couple of minutes where all 4 brawled and did spots on the chairs (obviously we all ran away like scared children).

While Jamie Hayter’s Christmas visit to her home promotion in the UK was a major selling point of “Let’s Slam Santa”, the main event was the Session Moth Martina show. We only got seconds of Jamie’s AEW theme and none of her (actually better) EVE theme of “Heads Will Roll” by Yeah Yeah Yeahs; instead Indignation morphed into Martina’s “Everytime We Touch” by Cascada entrance music, with the pair coming out with Martina’s new coach, Millie McKenzie.

Fans would have to wait a while for Hayter to be in action after the brief flurry we saw of Jamie at the start, with Martina “playing Ricky Morton” for an extended time with Alexxis and Rhio, the latter playing excellent heels in control despite pockets of people (probably Northerners) cheering for Rhio going against the grain of massive boos, something that felt impossible to happen at the beginning of 2025 when it comes to Rhio.

After a fun final stretch, “Millie-ball” wouldn’t get off to a great start for Martina with Alexxis Falcon getting the pin on her opponent for the first round of the She-1 in January after her Falcons Fury finisher.

A post-match beatdown of Hayter and Moth would be interrupted by the surprise return of Nightshade (which actually wasn’t that big a surprise to those who turned up at to the Big Penny dining area at 4pm to meet friends for food and ciders) avenging her injury at the hands of the champ Rhio in October, setting up a EVE Championship match down the line.

The final scenes saw a focus on Martina, who while in-storyline had another defeat on her record for 2025, had the endorsement from her friend Jamie, from their time together in Stardom pre-pandemic, who also had an announcement of her own.

Throughout the night, there were reminders from the host, Tizzy Von Tassel, about tickets being on sale for “Wrestle Queendom 8” at the O2 Indigo on March 8th. If anyone went on the AXS site to purchase those tickets, they wouldn’t have found any seats available as all 256 seats available were gone 28 hours after tickets first went on sale. It is literally standing room only now on offer.

To put perspective on that: “Elite Encounters” filled up to capacity on the day of the show with that capacity being 600 after just over 2 months being on sale, with that being their year’s best sales for a show. But with how the Big Penny is, a hefty percentage of those tickets sold are standing. Using guestimation maths (i.e counting people seated when watching the show back), it is around the 200-250 mark when it comes to the number of seats on offer at a EVE show on the first Friday of the month. This is one of the pound-for-pound best achievements in wrestling promotion in 2025.

The first two matches were announced for the Match 8th show to accompany what is the expected main event of the EVE Champion facing the winner of the 2025 She-1 on International Women’s Day. Kris Statlander is defending her International Title against Charlie, or TAFKA Dakota Kai, as the match render helpfully pointed out to those not in the know.

But it was Jamie Hayter’s challenge that got many people’s dream match radar popping. She set out her match for Indigo, Jamie vs Miyu Yamashita. A banger of a match with a capital b-a-n-g-e and r, it’s a match that will captivate fans in the Indigo on March 8th. It’s a match that will get eyeballs on it from those who enjoy seeing really fun matches, and it’s a celebration of women’s wrestling that could dominate the conversation of wrestling on that day and will be a night to remember on International Woman’s Day and EVE have earned the right to host this night after a fantastic 2025, with nights like “Let’s Slam Santa” being another tick in the great show column.

© Chris Gannon

On the 19th of December, Bridge Pro Wrestling and Spinebuster held a special show at the Amblecote British Legion Club in Stourbridge, with all proceeds going to UK independent wrestler Millie McKenzie. Millie requires a liver transplant due to the worsening of a chronic liver condition and has cut back on her wrestling schedule as a result. Chris Gannon wrote a feature on Millie in our last issue. Spinebuster also launched a GoFundMe for Millie’s recovery which is linked below.

Glasgow-based Insane Championship Wrestling (ICW) held their biggest show of the year, “Fear & Loathing XVII” at The Garage in Glasgow on 7th December. Angel Hayze won the ICW Women’s World Title from Lana Austin in a ladder match three-way with Daisy Jenkins as the other participant. Wolfgang, Arcade Violence (Brody Turnbull & Jake Lawless) and Rhio defended their Zero-G, Tag Team and World Heavyweight titles respectively, with Rhio beating Kenny Williams in a first-ever intergender “King of Insanity” match. The show is available in its entirety on TrillerTV+.

Their next show will host the 14th instalment of “Square Go!” The show will be on 8th February at The Asylum Glasgow, with Angel Hayze set to defend her newly won Women’s World Title against Kanji and Colton Davis challenging Rhio for her World Heavyweight Title.

Over The Top Wrestling (OTT) held their annual Christmas show on 21st December at the Europa Hotel in Belfast with five titles on the line and a surprise appearance from PROGRESS World Champion Man Like DeReiss. All champions retained, including Myla Grace defending her OTT Women’s Title against Angel Hayze as Emersyn Jayne was unable to make it.

OTT’s next show, “End Game”, is on 27th December at the Kilnamanagh Family Recreation Centre (KFRC) in Dublin. Tate Mayfairs, Ricky Sosa and Leyton Buzzard have all been announced for the show.

TNT Extreme Wrestling’s next two shows are on 31st January at Hangar 34. On “IGNition Rumble”, Critchy defends his TNT Ignition Heavyweight Title against Dean Allmark, Hollie Barlow takes on Skye Smitson in singles action and Trent Seven will appear in the IGNition Rumble match. Later that day on “Merseyside Massacre”, Rayne Leverkusen and Emersyn Jayne meet again following their PROGRESS Women’s Title match on 30th November. It will be Leverkusen’s TNT debut.

Sky News reported that Trent Seven is working with Oakwell Advisory, a sports advisory firm, to secure £5m of funding to help build “Project Fight.” The article also reports that Project Fight have had discussions with production company “Sunset+Vine” and Paramount, who own Channel 5, about collaborating ahead of a premium pilot event set to take place in 2026 pending the fundraiser. Trent Seven founded the “Fight Club: PRO” brand (FCP) in 2009, a promotion whose last event was March 2020 just before the COVID-19 lockdown in the UK.

Whilst there was not an explicit announcement linking the closure of the promotion with the Speaking Out movement, there were talent associated with the promotion that were implicated in the movement, such as former co-owner Martin Zaki who was removed from the promotion in June 2020 following sexual harassment allegations. During the same time period, PWTorch reported that Trent Seven had denied allegations against him that he was trying to get underage female fans drunk so that he could have sex with them. Additionally, head trainer at the time, Travis Banks, was accused of an inappropriate sexual relationship with Millie McKenzie, who was 17 during the relationship.

© wXw

wXw

On 8th December, WWE announced that Leon Slater would participate on John Cena’s retirement show, “Saturday Night Main Event” on 13th December. Slater had already been pulled from all announced dates that weekend, including wXw’s 25th anniversary show on 13th December. After WWE’s announcement, Fightful Select reported that wXw sources had claimed the bookings were agreed as far back as March and that given his contract, it was “kind of what the promotion expected.” The report noted that the promotion would have preferred some heads up from WWE rather than leaving Leon Slater in an unfortunate situation. The report noted that Slater’s TNA deal expires in late 2026. With TNA working with WWE, independent promotions are at the mercy of WWE’s late scheduling practices when booking TNA talent that are used on WWE TV.

On that 25th anniversary show, The Grind (Laurance Roman & Nick Schreier) won the World Tag Team Title from Planet Gojirah (Marc Empire & Robert Dreissker) while Peter Tihanyi defended his Unified World Wrestling Title against König Der Catcher 2025 tournament winner Ahura. In an encounter many are calling match of the night, Dutchman Ricky Sosa continued his rise in the independent scene as he beat Joseph Fenech Jr. and Zoltan in a three-way for the vacant European Title.

wXw’s upcoming shows are “We Love Wrestling #72” on 17th January in Bielefeld and their traditional year opener Back to the Roots in their regular venue of Turbinenhalle 2 in Oberhausen.

Minoru Suzuki has been announced for the “Ambition 17” show on 7th March 2026. It is his first wXw appearance since 2005. He has also been announced for Night 3 of the “16 Carat Gold” tournament.

In addition to the announcement that Los Tranquilos de Japon (BUSHI & Tetsuya Naito) will participate in the 16 Carat Gold tournament, they have also been announced for “Dead End” in Hamburg on 21st February. The Grind will defend their newly won World Tag Team Title against Los Tranquilos de Japon, unless they lose to The Greedy Souls on 24th January. 

Ricky Sosa and Thomas Shire have been announced as new participants in the “16 Carat Gold” tournament in March 2026.

© APC Catch

The French wrestling scene is undergoing its own “Speaking Out” movement which swept through the UK scene in 2020. On 9th December, a new account on Twitter by the handle of “@safe_catch_fr” and the display name of “PROTECT THE LOCKER ROOM” posted a message in French appealing to victims to contact them with testimonies with the goal of giving a voice to victims and witnesses of misconduct. The account accepts testimonies, whether anonymous or not, via private message or e-mail and encourages people to come forward. The announcement said that an investigation and documentation process will take place to avoid defamatory testimonies, and that while they do not require evidence in order to be contacted, they encourage it.

In what seems like a connected development even if not explicitly stated, French independent star Joseph Fenech Jr. announced a hiatus from wrestling due to an accusation levied against him. The details of the accusation are not known at the time of writing. Fenech Jr. stated that it was an old dispute he had believed was already settled, but would let the facts of the matter and the testimony speak for itself (sic machine translation). Referee Alex Schneider took the same approach while also explicitly denying the allegations against himself.

In a separate incident, France-based independent wrestler A-Buck was removed from future APC Catch events after he reposted messages with anti-Muslim sentiment. Once the promotion found the messages, they made an announcement re-affirming that they did not tolerate any form of discrimination or racism. A-Buck apologised in a statement on 9th December on his Twitter.

Following this, Banger Zone Wrestling (BZW) posted an announcement stating that they have removed individuals from BZW events until further notice. This prompted some backlash as BZW had used talent who had Speaking Out allegations against them such as Jay Lethal. Amale, who is in Japan on tour with Marvelous (Chigusa Nagayo’s promotion), responded to BZW’s announcement calling them “The Kings of the press release” (sic machine translation). Amale has also been retweeting posts critical of APC Catch.

APC Catch held “Winter Shock” on 7th December in Nanterre, France. Suplex Republik (Cuma Bolat & Zack Eriti) retained their APC Tag Team Title against Lykos Gym (Kid Lykos & Kid Lykos II) and Kuro held onto his APC Title in a three-way against Lio Rush and Man Like DeReiss.

While it was already previously announced, on the show to leave no doubt, it was reiterated that Andrade will be making an appearance in the promotion at the 12th anniversary show on 10th January. Suplex Republik will defend against Starboyz (Jadon Carter & Lio Jayce) while Celine Feary, JGU and Cory Zero will face off in a three-way following Celine’s attack on Cory and JGU at “Winter Shock”.

Banger Zone Wrestling (BZW) has announced their big show schedule for the first half of 2026, with shows on 24th January, 27th February, another collaboration with Rixe Catch on 14th March and further big shows on 23rd May and 4th July. Tetsuya Naito has already been announced for “Enter The Zone” on 24th January, as well as Jacob Vadocq defending the BZW Title against Jordan Oliver.

At KHAO’s “Hors Ligne” show on 20th December, Lashka defeated Big Damo in the main event with assistance from Hellmer Lo Guennec.

KHAO’s next shows will be on 28th February and 1st March to celebrate their 1st anniversary as an up and coming promotion in France. The show on 1st March is titled “Volume 1”, with Ricky Sosa already announced for the show.

German Wrestling Federation (GWF) hosted “Final Countdown 2025” on 7th December which can be viewed on YouTube, with the biggest news being that the wXw Unified World Wrestling Champion Peter Tihanyi lost to the GWF World Champion Rambo in the main event. Sunshine Machine (Chuck Mambo & TK Cooper) retained their Tag Team Title against Rott Und Flott (Michael Schenkenberg & Nikita Charisma). After defeating Aytac Bahar and Toni Harting, Ahura went on to defeat Toni Harting in singles action to become the next contender for the GWF Berlin Title. Jane Nero, who captured both her GWF Women’s Title and Independent Women’s Title on the last show, defended both against Madison Marley.

GWF’s next show is on 11th January at Festsaal Kreuzberg in Berlin.

Danish promotion BODYSLAM announced that Joe Lando would be making his debut in Denmark on 10th January at Pumpehuset in Copenhagen. Also on that show is the final chapter of the Aliss Ink and Carlos Zamora feud, Micheal Madsen’s final night as ring announcer, and Buster challenging Bam Bam Quaade for the BODYSLAM Title.

Italian promotion Squash A Jobber (SAJ) held a show, “Final Bout 4”, in Milan on 29th November, including Maki Itoh’s only European appearance since she became a freelancer a few months ago. Maki’s former 121000000 tag team partner, Miyu Yamashita, was also on the show taking on Luke Jacobs who replaced JJ Gale. NOAH’s Owadasan, who is on an excursion in Europe now wrestling under the name “Kouga”, was also there. Finally, in the biggest match on the show, SAJ Openweight Champion Sebastian De Witt retained his title against Merak. The show is available to watch on Hooked On Wrestling TV.

The next show on 31st January, “Evil Eye”, is already sold out due to the announcement of Tetsuya Naito.

SAJ was not the only Italian promotion with overseas talent on their show, as in the main event of DREAM’s show, “It’s Coming Home”, on 7th December, VENY was dethroned, losing her DREAM Title to Gianluca Vitale. Alongside being DREAM Champion, VENY has also made two appearances in EVE. European fans such as myself are hoping that it means there is an increase in her overseas bookings. The promotion’s runner, Max Peach, attacked Vitale after the main event to cut off the jubilant celebrations of Gianluca’s triumph. Also on the card was FantastICE Champion Akane Fujita and notable Japanese freelancer Shigehiro Irie.

SLAM! Wrestling, a Finnish promotion, were in Tallinn, Estonia on 12th December for their last show of the year. Their next show, “Wrestling Slam III” takes place at Rytmikorjaamo in Seinäjoki, Finland on 17th January. Talent announced for the show include NOAH’s Owadasan, Daz Black, Marcus of Man, Herco Wisky, Aliss Ink, Madison Marley and SLAM Fans can buy an ‘environmental ticket’ which donates €3 to the Finnish Natural Heritage Foundation to help protect conservation area within South Ostrobothnia, the region where the show will be held.

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