The British Beat - World of Sport, More
While British wrestling has never reached the mainstream status of the World of Sport era, UK grappling has made numerous TV appearances since being dropped by ITV in 1988. (ITV is a national network similar to NBC with up to 15 regional franchisees. Most peak-time programming – including World of Sport – airs nationwide, but up until recent years, many off-peak programming varied from region to region.)
Two events taped in Aberdeen in 1990 aired as pilots on ITV across Scotland and Northeast England but were not picked up. The shows largely featured Dale Martin promotion wrestlers including Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks.
It was ten years before the next British wrestling on ITV, which came via the Transatlantic Wrestling Challenge. Originally shown on digital channel ITV 2, it later aired on the main ITV channel in the Meridian, Anglia and HTV regions. A made-for-TV, studio-based event, it featured 16 wrestlers from the United States and the UK Hammerlock (now NWA-UK) promotion. The final episode also featured a women’s match with a then ultra-green Nikita – now WWE’s Katie Lea. Many viewers found the series disappointing because the matches had five-minute time limits to make them ‘TV-friendly’.
The much-hyped return of ‘wrestling’ to ITV on a national basis in 2005 proved a great disappointment. Despite the billing, ‘Celebrity Wrestling’ had nothing to do with the pro game (other than D Lo Brown and Joe Legend as guest coaches), instead featuring extremely minor celebrities in a series of grappling-related games and challenges. Scheduled opposite the hugely successful return of Doctor Who, the show suffered such poor ratings that it was moved from a Saturday evening slot after just five weeks.
The longest-running wrestling broadcast on a mainstream UK channel since 1988 came on S4C, the Welsh version of the national Channel 4. Reslo (Welsh for ‘wrestling’) aired a series each year between 1987 and 1995. It featured matches from specific tapings by local promoter Orig Williams plus bouts from the end-of-year tournaments in Europe. The satellite edition of S4C (which was available across the entire UK) re-ran many episodes in 2002 and 2003.
Cable channel Screensport, which was owned by newsagent chain WH Smith, began broadcasting in 1984. As well as a host of US promotions, the channel aired a British wrestling show produced by boxing promoter Pat Brogan. Mainly taped at Hanley using All-Star talent, the shows took advantage of the looser content regulation available on cable with a more action-packed and violent style, which was ideal for stars including Mark Rocco.
In 1989 the channel launched on satellite television, which had just reached the mass market in the UK. Jackie Pallo produced a six-show series under the ‘Wrestling Around The World’ banner, recorded at a mammoth one-night taping in Northampton. The show later appeared on Central (the local outlet of the terrestrial ITV network) and overseas. Featuring little in the way of name talent, Pallo’s son claimed the shows cost $160,000 to produce but only raised $30,000 in rights fees.
As well as the successful run on The Wrestling Channel/Fight Network (on which they have been the top-rated shows for most of the channel’s four-year lifespan), footage from ITV’s pre-1988 broadcasts have also appeared on two other satellite channels. Sky Sports produced eight shows in 1998 combining archive footage with contemporary interviews of the stars involved, while ESPN Classics aired several matches introduced by darts commentator Sid Waddell.
Meanwhile The Wrestling Channel/Fight Network has aired original programming from the FWA, 1PW and IPW-UK, plus a ‘UK Round Up’ show with matches from a variety of promotions. Today LDN remains the only original British wrestling programming on the channel, and indeed worldwide.
