David Mantell

Here we are. Preceded by a GLORIOUS promo with Haystacks talking about how tough "Us Americans" are. in a broad Manchester accent!!! Although to be fair, third team-mate Mighty John Quinn once cut an in ring "gee" on ITV about how his "Congressman" told him to beat up Big Daddy. Quinn was a Canadian, Canada has MPs not Congressmen Something I've noticed about this 1986 bout. There were quite a few RTL logos about. Was this a one off TV broadcast rather than a home video?

An oddity. Johnny South had been a regular visitor to the German/Austrian tournaments scene going back to the 1970s. Here in 1994 he turns up in his full tribute Legend of Doom gear. Since the Real Mike Hegstrand had visited the CWA and beaten Rambo here for the World title less than two years earlier, here the Legend becomes "British LOD" a slightly cowardly heel wannabe who runs away from the man the real Hawk beat for the biggest prize in European Wrestling not so long ago. British LOD is presented as having some front but covering and covering up whenever Rambo gets aggressive. It takes careful listening to get that German fans are giving British LOD "the bird" not cheering him, but it's the same whistling noise they gave Indio Guajaro against Dave Morgan 11 years earlier. Rambo mostly easily breaks South's holds and overpowers him. It's like comparing Tony StClair Vs Kendo Nagasaki to Tony Vs Bill Clarke as King Kendo. Rambo of course wins with a flying forearm. The footage quality and production incidentally are very good, almost the professional TV quality of the home videos of Otto's biggest 1980s title defences such as July 1980 Vs Don Leo or the final defence against Bull Power. There's also a commentator present. I believe there are videos on this channel of the rest of Hanover 1994 in similar condition. This is the year before South filmed his Reslo appearances as the Legend (singles bout Vs Paul "Raging Bull" Neu, elimination triple tag, Rumble) By 1999 he would be popular enough to be the man who ended Marty Jones's final World Mid Heavyweight Championship reign in April that year in Bristol. By 2002 he was gone from All Star as part of a clean out of tribute characters and a renewed focus on young talent such as Dean Allmark. Robbie Dynamite Berzins, Mikey Whiplash Gilbert etc etc.

As promised to @ohtani's jacket, here it is. ^^^

Just a quick one to bring the German thread level with the British and French threads in the last couple of days(two bouts each, one long one short) Heel Vs heel with Kauroff as the sympathetic heel getting the "KAU-ROFF!!! KAU-ROFF!!!" chants. Just highlights including KK totally dominating Brody in a finger interlock and easily breaking a full nelson then flipping the Colonel around. Brody and Klaus have a fairly slambang cartoon brawl winBridy doing his fall over the top rope spot from his Owen Hart match on New Catch. Q. What does VIEDERKOMPF mean? All I know is that German/Austrian fans like to sing it at heels.

Grand Prix Belt seminfinal. TThwn current TBW Vs twenty something ex TBW. Logan is by now a sharp operator, his rolls out of Ian's armbarcarecsharpmand swift, so is his pushing up from arm presses on the mat. Ian keeps the arm while Steve tries all sorts of tricks to escape or reverse it, none of which quite come off for hiim until Logan gets headscissors and Ian has tofree his hand release to snap open the scissorhold. Logan gets a full nelson into snapmares into further nelson press for two one counts- his transitions are really sharp and snappy. McGregor gets the arm back in a top wristlock, trying for a grapevine. Logan rolls then gets a fireman's carry but Ian starts putting on an armlock up there so Logan dumps him on a top turnbuckle. Logan gets a rear waistlock into kneeling front chancery into side chancery into cross press for some 1 counts. McGregor gets loans arms then strikes with a lean back dropkick. Ian gets a snapmare into headlock. Logan breaks it up then curls the arm back again into a hammerlock into double wristlock, riding his man to the mat. He switches to shoulder press for 2. McGregor gets a side chancery and chop to the neck, then a monkey climb., but somewhere in this Logan gets a wrist lever which he keeps until the bell. Round 2 Logan gets a standing full nelson into armlock. He throws Ian to the mat but Ian stands so Logan come off the middle rope to throw Logan. Ian tries positioning but Logan throws him again. Logan has McGregor in the armbar, the knee holding it in place. Ian gets a great cross buttock press but McGregor still has the hold. Logan again gets the headscissors and twists with it. Logan turns into the upright and uses a foot to power his roll forward out of the scissors and straight into a side headlock, but Logan scissors him again. He lets go as McGregor exerts more pressure with thecside headlock - "He MUST keep his head away" notes Kent. Ian still has the headlock until Logan jams him in the stomach. Logan posts him to the corner, catches him on the rebound with a rear chancery throw and bodycheck. He backs out of a full nelson and comes off the ropes with a sunset flip into double leg nelson folding press for the first fall. Round 3., Ian gets a legdive and leglock. Logan tries grabs to the head, widening Ian's legs, going for the wrist and the head again, but the leglock stays. He turns himself into the Gotch toehold position but Ian manages to get it on securely and go for the arms for a surfboard but gives up the leglock to focus on the double arms. Putting a knee in the shoulder blades. He switches to a single arm and gets a posting. (a mistake, reckons Kent Walton.) Logan forearms him and knees him in the stomach. McGregor gets a headlock, Logan lifts him up but Ian while up there gets a headscissor and takes his man down. Logan turns into the upright then the other side position. McGregor still has the headscissor. Logan tries a bridge plus snapout. Then he tries a headscissor of his own which finally does the trick. They agree to stalemate. Logan gets a chest headbutt and forearm smash, side chancery into side headlock and bodycheck. He gets a rear chancery throw into double knees press for three one counts. He gets a legdive, flying elbowsmash and ground double top wristlock. McGregor straightens it into an armbar and rolls to tighten the hold. He forces a high whip and gets a bodyscissors. . Logan tries for three pin attempts, on the third using a foot to pull the bodyscissors down and off! He grapevines each leg. McGregor tries some prelim escapes but the bell goes. Round 4. McGregor takes a side headlock, Logan throws him off. He rebounds with a not very powerful bodycheck. Logan feigns a full nelson and dishes out a heel of hand to stomach. a headbutt and a knee then one more butt to the stomach which floors McGregor for 9. Logan delivers a rear snapmare an elbowdrop and a crosspress for two. They collide in the ring. Ian is up before, he whips Logan into the ropes. As before Logan comes back with a sunset flip but McGregor crawls through and flips it over into a bridging folding press for the equaliser - and a beauty it is! Round 5. McGregor gets a heädlock, Logan grabs an inverted side waistlock for an over the knee backbreaker. Ian gets double legs and a folding press but Logan crawls out. Logan gets a wristlever, whips McGregor into the ropes and catches him with a dropkick, reverses a posting and catches him again on the rebound with a forearm smash. He gets a side chancery and bodycheck but McGregor gets a cross buttock and press for 2. Logan gets a loose throw for 5, McGregor tries the same double legs into folding press but again Logan crawls out. Logan gets side headlock into side chancery I to low power hiptoss into armlock - a transition sequence of four moves in under a second! - and twists the Arn into a semi Japanese Stranglehold (the Million Dollar Dream). McGregor forces upright and so Logan loosens the cold, gets in two mighty shoulderblocks and turns his man into a back hammerlock on the mat. He resists long enough so Logan releases and Ian is up at 8. Logan elbowsmashes Ian's arm and further weakens it with a high forward Whip that not only makes Ian take a bump but also stretches the arm further. Logan goes sfor the arm again with a lean back dropkick straight on the bicep itself! He gets a stomach jab and McGregor gets double knees to Logan's head. Logan gets side heädlock into an armbar, driving his free arm into the joint. He lands an elbow on the back tricep where his free arm was sawing away. He yanks the arm and fires a forearm smash at Ian. The bell goes. Round 6 and final. Quick handshake. McGregor gets the wristlock, slingshot into ropes - and catches his man with a neat dropkick. McGregor gets a front chancery, Logan reaches for the knee counter but cannot get the grip. He gets the knee finally, lifts and drops to break the hold. Finger Interlock and McGregor gets an arm and a posting but Logan springs up in the corner, back leapfrogs Ian but is taken down behind in a folding press for a pin attempt but Logan crawls out. He throws McGregor into the ropes and young Ian comes back with a flying tackle but .Logan gets the better of it, secures a bodyslam and cross press for the three. That gives him the 2-1 win and a place in the final against Marvellous Mike Bennett. Bennett would win the tournament and belt, the final payoff of his 1985-1986 heel push. A belt, not the belt he was after a year and a half earlier when he started his pursuit of Danny Collins and the British Welterweight Championship. Good technical bout, only flaw is a certain amount of pausing and hesitation while thinking what to do next by both men. The falls were all great with McGregor's bridging folding press consolation equaliser the absolute gem of the match.

Father and son team up, like the Boothmans and the Kilbys back home in Blighty. Alex and Steve both share the same attack skills (technical plus acrobatic) and they even get in the ring the same cartwheeling way. Generally it's Alex that does the FIP stuff and Steve that makes the save - until dad goes down to a Yamamoto leg drop for the opening fall. When Steve makes a tag, Alex takes a while to get going before going on the attack, hecsoin enough tags Dad back who gets the equaliser on Yamamoto. Alex does come back but ends up getting caught in a folding press by Finlay - his first good move of the match - for the decider. There's not a lot to be said about the heels. Yamamoto is your standard German Wrestling Surly Tokyo Street Thug heel and Finlay is just his regular early 90s bully boy self, here against Alex mostly. Great shot at the start where fans are singing songs about Finlay and he just stares DAGGERS at them. Some good moves from the Wrights but basically your standard face Vs heel match, there to make the fans happy - until it makes them unhappy, natch.

(@ohtani's jacket there is 8mm colour fancam of Hell's Angels Vs Dennisons and I've posted it to the British thread long ago. I can bump it up if you like) We arrived at the Elysee Montmartre and get a potted history of its roots as a dancehall. Roger Delaporte who owned the place is in the front row. First off we get a few minutes of the end of Monsieur Montreal Vs Inca Viracocha. In the 1960s Montreal was a French version of Tarzan Johnny Wilson, same sort of handsome muscleman. Apparently Montreal 's real name is Marcel Cherot and Monsieur Montreal is an old bodybuilding title he won. It's the last few mins of a strength match. Sanniez gets cheered while Caclard (or Calgar according to the INA official YT) gets booed, like the split reaction for Savage and Elizabeth in the mid 80s. Caclard has a similar crewcut/goatee look to heel Bernie Wright in 1985 Germany. He and Sanniez can do all the characteristics French "Vaultigeur" stuff as well as Les Bons. Things really speed up when Khader is tagged in against Sanniez. Sanniez makes no attempt to tone things down so as not to upstage Les Bons - in many respects he is still a Bon at this point and he and Caclard are a Pareja Incredible. The first time Caclard tries to reverse snapmares himself out of a Hassouni hammerlock, Khader just releases the hold and lets him crash but he pulls off the counter a few minutes later. Roca can do the Scisseaux Volees counter to armbars. So far no sin of the back somersault response to a top wristlock. Les Mechants double get nastier, both of them including Sanniez stomping Rocas and Hassouni dropkicking the pair of them out the ring, one foot each. Caclard seems to be the nastier of the two. Roca's gets a surfboard on Sanniez, the announcer calls it "un Pippon.". Les Bons double team Sanniez in their corner and even try tying the tag rope to his foot but he pulls out of it. The heels eventually strike a hot tag inasmuch as heels can. Hassouni still dominates Caclard but Caclard fight back better. Rocas gets the opener on Sanniez with a sunset flip despite Caclard's attempt at interference. Les Mechants get an extended period of dominance over Rocas with Sanniez stinging away with repeated dropkicks. While not tagged in he leaps the ropes to dropkick Roca's who is recovering from a posting, then holds the top rope to spring back outside to the ring apron. Caclard quickly drapes himself across Roca's for the equaliser and the crowd are FURIOUS. Caclard has a vicious heel Dynamite Kid look to him. The heels have some great double teams, Caclard holding Roca's in a full nelson for a Sanniez dropkick. Later when Hassouni has made the hot tag. Caclard gets dropkicked to ringside and gets into a fight with Delaporte and some other ringsiders who throw him in, lumberjack match style. Hassouni gets posted by Caclard but he backwards leapfrogs him and rolls him up in a folding press for the decider. It is, as OJ Says a very fast paced engaging bout, although it loses some shine as the heels take over and gain their heat. A good exhibition of the French style.

Bit of a quickie. Probably the first case of All Star putting on ex W(W)WF talent. Irish Pat Barratt was a star on ITV in the Sixties before going to America in the Seventies for some years, a sojourn that involved replacing Victor Rivera mid reign in 1975 as Dominic DeNucci's WWWF World Tag Team Championship partner. Here he makes a splash on ASW's Sattelite Wrestling show, putting out John Kowalski (by now minus the blond hair) in a few minutes with a sleeper.

Sixteen years earlier in Bremen... As with the Terry Funk match that year, Finlay is the Quasi babyface sympathetic heel, although not as emphatically the good guy as in 2012. The Rapmaster is anything but. Looking like a cross between an unmasked Kendo Nagasaki and Nasty Boy Jerry Sags with a shaved head, ponytail and black leather tailcoat and hard rock ring entry music. Only the pink and black ring gear really makes him recognisably PN News from WCW. He also does the odd basic scientific move like a fireman's carry, or trying for a single leg Boston Crab before Finley kicks him off. Referee is Didier Gapp, the referee so miserable that Germans think of him as a comedy hero. He doesn't do much of note, just gets on with the job. He manages to lure Finlay back from an out of the ring brawl, even if he then kicks Neu off the ring apron. Eventually they go at it outside the ring, with Neu backdropping Finlay on the floor and Finlay dashing back at the last second to turn a double knockout into a knockout win. Sorry OJ. P.S. the 2012 bout has just come on my smart TV. Didier refereed that too. By then he was totally bald and quite tubby.

Speaking of Dave Morgan, here is another match where he comes out from behind his Maschke and is the good guy. That time, which I must have seen but didn't review apparently, but I mention it in the bowels of the British thread on page 19 in July 23: That time was a clean match, this is blue eye versus villain, the villain in question that loveable old rogue with the Afro hairdo Indio Guajaro. According to a personality profile at the end, Indio is from Colombia and Morgan is heavyweight champion of something called the NWF (no idea if there is any connection to the early 70s promotion that Pedro Martinez ran out of Buffalo NY - more likely it's a mishmash of NWA and WWF dreamed up by a promoter who has been reading American wrestling magazines.) It's March 1983 so in a yellow roped ring just like that Roland Bock clip against Don joni El Coral. We get a long voiceover during the intro but this doesn't become a commentary, just an explanatory voice that PPS up now and then. Good guy Dave is a mild mannered heavyweight. He and Indio exchange basic technical stuff in the early rounds, more like a British heavyweight bout that a German bout of the time, with Dave getting the best of it. Dave does a good French style headscissors takedown counter to armbars. Indio puts up his hands in victory and the crowd give him the bird (the whistling noise, not finger gestures.) He can also cartwheel like Danny Collins (making his pro debut around this time.) Bad guy Indio sells a lot of Dave's offence, takes bumps, gets hit with double ankles and dropkicks, sells holds and is utterly humiliated so the audience are laughing mockingly at him. Eventually he gets some heat bashing Dave around with forearm smashes. It looks like Indio either can't roll out of an armbar or doesn't want to upstage good guy Dave who gets bored waiting for the roll and boots Indio in the stomach. Indio gets darker heat when he starts choking Dave out on the ropes. He puts his hands up and gets actual boos because this time he is winning. He pitches Dave to ringside just as the round ends. The MC has to shout SCHTOP!! SCHTOP!! as he chokes Morgan. Morgan makes his comeback headscissoring Indio around and dropkicking his out the ring. Then he goes too far and ties up Indio and charges him and gets a Yellow Card. The German fans have no equivalent of Aux Chiottes L'Arbitre, they just give the ref The Bird (see above). Indio soon gets his heat back but Morgan suddenly gets a side folding press roll up for the win.

This clip is 9.5 mins long but we only get about 5 minutes of match. Chenok may have been a Baron when he jobbed the European Welterweight Championship to Danny Collins as part of the 1985 FA Cup Final coverage earlier that year (or is it next year? As you can see from the thumbnail it says 1984! @sergeiSem can you explain ) but here he is the German working class babyface, a mixture of Roland Bock, Mick McMichael with a moustache and C21st Flesh Gordon with a combover. Denis Goulet we've seen on here in the past, upcoming French TBW of the period. Indio is kind of like N'Boa with a dead snake. We saw him and Bernie team years later with Indio (with Steve on the other side!) and it didn't make much sense, but here it does - Bernie is kind of it Bearcat mode here with a crewcut and short beard looking like Syd Cooper's kid brother, not Steve Wright's. Anyway, five mins action and it ends awkwardly. Indio and Bernie clean the ring of everyone - it took me two attempts to pick up that they were DISQUALIFIED and they decide they've won the fight and are making their exit when Chenok gives Indio a smack in the mouth on the way out. We are then treated to an audio profile piece with Chenok and an audio promo with the man, both in German. In between we get a shot of Chenok flying bodypressing Bernie and highlights of what looks like the Birmingham Steve Logan versus Dave Morgan plus a mini tribute piece to Rene Lataserre.. Who is this Wener Bendig? Is he on here?

Triple tag matches, they were called over here.

Talking of both McMichael and a bald Mulligan, here they both are with Daddy and Mel Stuart who also went bald after previously sporting a Daddy-esque blond crop top in the early 70s. It's Daddy and Mick's warmup for The Rockers (Pete Lapaque and Tommy Lorne) on Cup Final Day a couple of months later. THhhe Rockers manager Charlie McGee is in the villains corner and frankly looks like a bigger scarier heel than either principal heels. Typical Daddy fodder with Mick as the FIP getting rescued by Daddy. Daddy briefly comes in and has both heels grovelling and prostrating themselves. Mick gets an advantage over Mulligan and scores the first fall with a bodyslam. Mick eventually gets into hideous trouble finishing in a Boston Crab but slowly, pulling the canvas up excruciatingly McMichael claws his way back to Daddy who tags Daddy to splash and pin Stuart.

I'd been interested to see the Liverpool Skinheads as they had been involved in some prototype Big Daddy tag matches in 1976 in the Best/Wryton area (at a time when some Joint members were still trying to put on Haystacks and Daddy as a heel tag team (They would resolve this on the night by having the two big men fall out as Daddy was no longer able to accept Stax's heel tactics. No they are not bald but skins in the 60s 70s generally weren't - they had short hair (Terry's is pushing it a bit. Paul looks the part, like Slade drummer Don Powell circa 1970's album Play .It Loud) and the braces and Doc Marten boots were more indicators of the skin style. Mulligan was no skinhead, he was just balding and would soon ditch the rest of it. It's not a great environment to show off the blue eyes but at least they score two good falls, Faulkner getting the rear rolling double shouldepress on Mulligan.Kung Fu then gets a Straight Second with a rear kick on the top turnbuckle and snapmare into folding press with bridge. Two nice bits afterwards - Paul quietly walks up and unheelishly shakes Faulkner's hand and Faulkner gets absolutely MOBBED by three young girls in 70s street fasion- yay. Ring Rats on World of Sport!

I'm currently watching this match and not reached the Manchette stage, so thanks for warning me in advance OJ otherwise I might have been tempted to try a blow by blow account. So far it's great technical bout with plenty ofl the characteristic French moves. At ringside is Rene Ben Chemoul's old dad and a 70 year old lady megafan of le catch who was presumably born 1897 and perhaps saw Hackenschmidt in his prime as a little girl. UPDATE, the Manchettes have started and the crowd get grumpy. Fortunately it's gone technical again. about a rolling figure four armlock, and la Publique are clapping again. Thee are further bursts of it in the final five minutes interspersed with better stuff- Scisseaux Volees and suchlike.. Bordes gets the winner with a sunset flip.

We were discussing a page or two back the mysterious Eurostars TV show of the Nineties/Noughties and possibility Tenties which gave the world such treats as the FYR Macedonia TV taping. Here is a match from that show 's peak period circa 2007 taped in a large and very modern arena before a packed house (allegedly due to a WWE/John Cena boom in France at the time). There is a Eurostars watermark on the footage Flesh is now in his bald tubby moustachioed phase, looking like Terry Rudge dressed as Sean Waltman for Halloween. He has two young TBWish tag partners, White Thunder and Jimmy Gavroche. Scott Ryder by this point has graduated to be Flesh's nemesis, a Giant Haystacks to Flesh's Big Daddy. The irony being that Scott is not actually very tall. He has two monster Highlanders with him Collosus and Mark McGibbon (sic) who totally dwarf him in term of size. Together they are The Scottish connection. Flesh early in gets an Avertisement for choking Ryder on the ropes. then a second one for not going back to his corner. Apparently by this point the rules have changed so you need FIVE Avertisements, not three, to get DQd (which clears up a mystery from Flesh's match with Horatio Le Pirate from around this time.) Flesh gets TOTALLY overpowered by Collosus and tags White Storm while Ryder tags in for the Connection and soon clocks up two Avertisements of his own for squishing one of the youngsters continuously in the corner. Both the lighter Bons are good high flyers but only Jimmy really hints at the classic French "Vaultigeur" style (RBC, Prince, Saulnier, Angelito, young Flesh, Zefy) we discussed previously. He gets some good moves on Ryder (who plays the Uncle Ivan of the Scottish Connection) but loses the equaliser when Scotty counters a sunset flip attempt with an Earthquake splash. The big Scotsmen triple team Gavroche until they blow a trick and he makes the hot tag. I missed who to and anyway Flesh and Thunder (no relation to Darren Walsh's heel alter ego) double dropkick and double clothesline various Mechants before Jimmy ends up legal man in the ring and turns a backflip/Kid McCoy Yorkshire Rope Trick in a hold into a shoulder press. RBC would be impressed. He gets a pin to make it 2-1. I check the time on my video, there are still another seven minutes left. Turns out it's best if five falls, I must have missed this being explained at the start. Thunder tags in and drops a flying axehandle on funky McGibbon's arm held up by Gavroche. The two youngsters swap places to do the same spot then all three bons in succession Stinger Splash Mark McG. He ends up at ringside as Colossus manhandles both youngsters until they roll away and then joined by Flesh, double and triple dropkick another Scottish Superheavyweight to ringside. That just leaves Scott Ryder. Flesh holds him down before getting out of the way at the last second from a White Thunder top rope splash for the winner. It's fun, there was a good house and hopefully the two young guys have gone onto more good stuff in the 18 years since. Healthy looking scene.

Mitzi Muller, then British Ladies champion, wife (now widow) of All Star promoter Brian Dixon, mother of All Star ring announcer Laetitia Dixon, ex mother in law of wrestler Dean Allmark, grandmother of current All Star boy king Joseph Dixon and daughter of 1930s wrestler Pat Connolly. goes on a chat show to protest about Women's wrestling not being allowed on TV - and ironically gets to wrestle on TV, first by giving the presenter a darn good stretching and sending him off to bed a happy boy no doubt, second with a clip of an 80s ladies tag match on an ASW show, sadly cut off as the action starts. Mitzi would eventually get on to ITV in 1988 as a ring announcer beating a path for her daughter (and following Princess Paula Valdez's path of getting onto ITV in a non wrestling capacity, in her case managing her husband). Interestingly, by this time Reslo on S4C - as much under the IBA's remit as World of Sport on ITV (but as the Welsh say, London never notices anything west of the Severn Bridge) - was regularly featuring top ladies' talent on its show (I'd have to check if Mitzi herself appeared but wouldn't swear it off).

(I've also gone and posted some examples on the German thread.)

A couple of more modern examples of this. This is from an All Star show at former TV Venue the Royal Spa Centre in Leamington Spa 11.5 years ago. I was (probably) in attendance. And here is a more recent example from, er. Rumble Promotions: Okay. Just to compliment those videos from Britain, here is the Royal Rumble concept in Germany/Austria

A couple of more modern examples of this. This is from an All Star show at former TV Venue the Royal Spa Centre in Leamington Spa 11.5 years ago. I was (probably) in attendance. And here is a more recent example from, er. Rumble Promotions:

I just went and compared a 1973 Petit Prince Vs Daniel Noced bout to Steamboat Vs Savage. There are further comparisons to be made with this one which puts the recently unmasked Hamill against the Northeast's finest dirty wrestler Black Jack Mulligan. Mulligan still has his long hair in 1978 which would be gone by 1981 (possibly due to a hair match?) and it makes him look like Bray Wyatt. The bout is most Kung Fu (in a fetching peach gin with a pitb. throwing chops and flyer and Mulligan getting in the odd sneaky trick and getting punished for it by Max Ward. British referees were a tough old bunch, much like Martial or Roger Delaporte in France and Max Ward was the harderst of the lot. An entire generation of viewers grew up impersonating his Knockout counts "WUN-er, TOO-er, THREE-er, FAW-er!! ..."

I can't help but compare this to Savage Vs Steamboat. Not just because it puts a face/Bon in long white tights and a high flying style against a bearded baddy with a quick vicious brawling style but because of the sheer ENERGY of the bout. Prince unleashes all his speed moves and Nicer sells them bumping around, occasionally getting in one of his own. When Nicer takes over in the middle of the bout, he is a whirlwind of blows. However he can cartwheel and backflip as well as Prince, sometimes keeping it under wraps to not upstage Le bon. All that is needed is an Elizabeth and a George Steele. The former is catered for by the unseen but much talked of Madame Noced who is reportedly looking on with the Noceds' two children. The latter arrives at the end of the match in the sale of one of the Klondyke Brothers (Bill rather than Jake) who comes to the ring to fend off a postmatch attack by Noced and congratulate Prince. I gather they had another ten minutes TV match the following year 1974. I shall have to look that one up.

Incidentally @Jetlag how influential would you say was Steve Wright on the 90s generation of young talent like Ulf, Eckstein, Kovacs, Schumann, Alex etc? Would you be inclined to agree with my suggestion - as discussed earlier in this thread - that the shift in German style away from the slower methodical style of Bock, Chall, Dieter Senior etc towards a more agile British-influenced style was attributable to Steve? If not, who or what else prompted the shift in style?

To cheer me up from that lost review, here is a nice biography of McMichael from Wrestling Heritage. https://wrestlingheritage.co.uk/mick-mcmichael/

Ah, I see. Shoot was a Pun in that case?