I’ve been a WWE fan ever since the day I saw The Undertaker beat Hulk Hogan with a Tombstone Piledriver to win the WWF Championship.
I was nine-years-old and absolutely mesmerised by the larger than life characters of the squared circle. And as I got older, I clearly didn’t grow up, because my love of wrestling never went away – taking me from watching Ric Flair win the Royal Rumble on TV, to interviewing him over breakfast in New York. Wooo!
I always hoped I’d get to share this passion with my children (aka indoctrinate them). But I never imagined how obsessed they’d become with watching Raw and SmackDown every week on Netflix, or how excited they’d be when I told them we had tickets to go see their heroes live at the AO Arena in Manchester on the company’s UK tour.
After a summer spent playing with WWE action figures, listening to WWE songs on every car journey and doing WWE moves on their dad in the swimming pool all holiday, they could not have been more hyped. And it turned out to be a night none of us will ever forget.
Ticket prices ranged from around £60 in the upper tier, to £127 in the lower tier, and as much as £210 on the floor near ringside. Yet the show lasted more than three hours, from 7.30pm to nearly 10.45pm, and that wasn’t all.
When WWE come to town, there’s always fans who wait outside parking areas and stadium entrances to catch a glimpse of the wrestlers arriving at the venue. And plenty of the stars are willing to come over and pose for photos and sign autographs.
My daughter, 10, and son, eight, were incredibly lucky because their dad had some interviews to do backstage before the show began. And when SmackDown star Zelina Vega was kind enough to pose for a picture with them, it got photobombed by CM Punk!
The difference between a TV recording of Raw or SmackDown and what WWE refers to as a “house show”, which this was in Manchester, can be seen in the style of the wrestling and the atmosphere. House shows aren’t included as part of their official programming and don’t tend to impact on current storylines. There’s still plenty of great in-ring action, but it’s fun, relaxed and the performers let loose with more audience interaction.
The wrestlers’ entrances don’t come with all the pyrotechnics and grand visuals you see on TV, but seeing my children’s reaction to the theme songs of their favourite stars was brilliant, as they jumped up and down and sang along to every word. It was also very loud – if you have sensitive little ones, you might want to bring some ear defenders!
The whole arena was bouncing when Jey Uso made his entrance to join his brother Jimmy Uso and cousin Jacob Fatu. The former world champion even had the referee and ring announcer Byron Saxton ‘Yeeting’ before they defeated MFT (Solo Sikoa, Tonga Loa and JC Mateo with Talla Tonga at ringside) in the opening match. Sikoa’s ringside antics were hilarious, provoking the audience and asking a woman at ringside to give him a call for a date.
My children’s wide-eyed expressions and reactions as the action unfolded was priceless. They couldn’t get over how loud the ring was as stars were suplexed and powerslammed onto the canvas. And during WWE Women’s United States Champion Giula’s match against our friend Zelina, my son turned to me and said “there aren’t any replays – if you miss it, you miss it!”
My daughter agreed, commenting “a blink of an eye in wrestling and you miss the whole thing,” before screaming out “cheat!” as Giula’s manager Kiana James interfered to help her gain victory. Their commentary amused me all evening.
WWE Tag Team Champions The Wyatt Sicks were “even creepier in real life”. And when LA Knight emerged as a surprise tag team partner for Rey Fenix to face the Wyatts, my son waved the poster he’d made for his favourite like his life depended on it and was convinced Knight had pointed at it, as the ex-WWE United States Champion made his entrance.
WWE veteran The Miz mocked Manchester, “the home of Oasis… overrated, miserable and living off a reputation that died two decades ago”. Boos rang out until Scottish fan favourite Joe Hendry answered his open challenge in a surprise appearance, prompting a mass sing-a-long of ‘I Believe in Joe Hendry’. He won with a Standing Ovation chokeslam, as my daughter yelled: “Take the L Miz!”
(Image: Manchester Evening News)
WWE’s female performers have totally changed perceptions of women’s wrestling over the last decade and I loved seeing my son and daughter both equally excited by Charlotte Flair and Alexa Bliss defeating The Judgment Day’s Raquel Rodriguez and Roxanne Perez. We’d earlier met Rodriguez – “I can’t believe Racquel is actually quite nice,” noted my daughter.
After an interval of around 20 minutes, a lovely, emotional moment saw an unknown tag team, the ‘Manchester Maniacs’, defeat The New Day with the help of the War Raiders. One of the masked ‘Maniacs’ (who hadn’t done a great deal, truth be told, leaving fans initially baffled by their appearance) was then revealed to be comedian Michael McIntyre, filming for his Big Show on BBC.
He brought out two children, one of whom explained his life was saved by Manchester Children’s Hospital. McIntyre asked where their dad was, with the boy explaining his father had just said he had to “take a work call”. The crowd jeered, but then the other ‘Maniac’ took off his mask to reveal he was the children’s dad! WWE and McIntyre’s team then announced a £10,000 donation to the hospital.
It was my daughter’s turn to wave her handmade poster for her favourite, Jade. Seeing the power and athleticism of these performers live is something else – my daughter gasped as she hurled WWE Women’s Champion Tiffany and rival Nia Jax around the ring, before Tiffany got the win.
The roof of the arena nearly came off as Mexican luchador Penta, ultimate underdog Sami Zayn and then the biggest name on the show, CM Punk, hit the ring for a six-man tag team main event against The Judgment Day. Zayn danced like crazy to CM Punk’s ‘Cult of Personality’ theme and my children did the same.
Finn Balor of The Judgment Day had the crowd in stitches when imitating Penta’s signature walk, while fans chanted “massive, massive head” at his tag team partner JD McDonagh. “You’re not going to get that in America,” my daughter observed.
Balor then donned a Tottenham shirt and posed with a cardboard Europa League trophy and a poster boasting about Spurs’ big wins over Manchester United and Manchester City. While fans also got to see the unique sight of Roxanne Perez interfering to hit her Pop Rox finishing move on CM Punk.
After the good guys got the win, Zayn got on the microphone and explained how he recently suffered a cancelled flight to Ireland, which meant he missed seeing Oasis live in Dublin. He then led the whole crowd in singing ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger’, but rather than ‘Sally’ in the lyrics, “so Sami can wait!”
CM Punk joked he thought it was a Beatles song and Zayn revealed Jey Uso has never heard of Oasis, before CM Punk told the fans he was last in Manchester with WWE some 13 years ago and said: “I’ve missed you all so much.”
As the three victors posed for photos with fans at ringside and we took our own together up in the stands, my son turned to me with a smile a mile wide and said: “That was amazing.”
You can watch WWE live events, including Raw and SmackDown, and every WWE Premium Live Event on Netflix in the UK and Ireland with an active Netflix subscription.
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
