French catch

[David Mantell]

Quote

Tuesday is French Catch Day: Tom! Lang! Mercier! Sanniez!

 

Tiny Tom vs Cowboy Lang 7/3/82

 

MD: This is one we thought we had at some point and that might be out there but we never did find it until now. We come in 10 minutes JIP and go another 10 and it was quite good actually. Delaporte is the ref and of course he was perfect for this scenario. What i liked about it though is that there was a decent amount of wrestling between the comedy spots. They went hand to hand repeatedly and Lang especially had some nice stuff including a roll back wristlock takedown and a roll through double arm where he tied Tom up. Tom was more apt to use roughneck tactics, step on the toes or toss Lang out. I bet if we had the first ten there'd be even more wrestling and this would be even better.

 

The comedy absolutely hit. A lot of it are spots you've seen before like Delaporte catching Tom out of a pin attempt kick out or Tom being pushed off on a figure four and crotching Delaporte. High class stuff but Delaporte's reactions pushed it all over the top. Right at the twenty minute announcement they went home with it with Lang winning on an airplane spin (though making sure to dizzily wave to Delaporte before falling on Tom). And everyone was happy with what they got.

 

Marc Mercier vs Albert Sanniez 7/3/82

 

MD: How good is even old Sanniez? Let me put it this way. If this had been the first Catch match we came across, instead of Cesca vs Catanzaro, we would have thought that young Marc Mercier was one of the best wrestlers in the world. Sanniez is just that good. We had a few matches of his throughout the footage but not nearly as many as we would have liked so it's great to see him here, even if a lot of the goal was to put a spotlight on Guy's 20-21 year old kid. 

 

The first ten minutes of this was Sanniez really putting him through his paces with a lot of great wrestling, hold after hold, with Mercier having all the counters you'd want, including up and overs and everything else. At the ten minute mark, Mercier did a cartwheel out of a throw and Sanniez got annoyed and clocked him and the match opened up. Lots of little moments of personality here where he'd feign that he didn't use a closed fist. Mercier was rough around the edges but he had a wild sort of abandon which made some things look better and some worse. Sanniez went for a flip bomb at one point and Mercier didn't make it over and landed in a nasty way. 

 

They'd ground things back down with quick pin exchanges or other bits of wrestling before going back to the moves and it was all quite good. Mercier took a nasty bump over the top and sold it big until his comeback, which didn't quite connect for me. Just lack of experience and an unwillingness to look vulnerable. If he had gotten leaned on just a bit longer it would have meant all the more. But in general, this was good and I'm putting most of that on Sanniez.

 

SR: It's a look at late career Albert Sanniez and young Marc Mercier. God what a size mismatch this was. Mercier towered over the old veteran. But all that be damned, they did some really good wrestling here. Mercier is a perfectly competent young athletic guy and Sanniez is too much of a master to not go hard into some slick exchanges. Some really good stuff early on. For some reason we haven't seen many highly technical matches in the colour footage, maybe they didn't make TV, maybe they weren't archived, maybe no one could do them anymore, so this was a bit of a flashback to the glory days of lightweight catch. Sanniez ended up dropping Mercier on his head with an ill fated attempt at a powerbomb and it seemed they lost their way a bit at that time. The bout fizzled along with Sanniez being seemingly too proud to let Mercier outwrestle him and the bout failed to build steam. There were some sick manchettes and both guys threw punches, so it's not like it was a bad bout or anything, but it made me want to go back and check out the matches from the glory days. This had a good ending though with Mercier hitting a missile dropkick of all things and then at least getting a good win over the old coot.

 

Labels: Albert Sanniez, Cowboy Lang, French Catch, Marc Mercier, Tiny Tom

Reviews to follow. We've featured a large chunk of the the Mercier- Sanniez match on here in the past which I shall bump up before doing my own review (possibly re-review in the case of Mercier-Sanniez). but Mercier himself seems to think that the match took place in 1978 - that's what he has it labelled as on the FFCP's YouTube account.

[David Mantell]

Just now, David Mantell said:

@Matt D wrote: 

If this had been the first Catch match we came across, instead of Cesca vs Catanzaro, we would have thought that young Marc Mercier was one of the best wrestlers in the world.

Of course in my case my first taste of Marc was his unsuccessful shot at Marty Jones in 1988, so I knew the score with Marc back in the day when I was 14.  I think I shall either bump that one up too or else do a new review over on the British thread.

[Phil Lions]

24 minutes ago, David Mantell said:

Mercier himself seems to think that the match took place in 1978 - that's what he has it labelled as on the FFCP's YouTube account.

INA's own listing aside, Tiny Tom and Cowboy Lang weren't around in France in 1978 so Mercier is 100% wrong about the year.

[David Mantell]

On 8/27/2024 at 12:35 AM, David Mantell said:

Marc Mercier vs. Alex Sanniez (1978)

 

Mercier was a young French talent who appeared on WoS once facing Marty Jones. He had a car accident in 1989 that forced him to retire and later became a promoter reactivating the defunct FFCP promotion in 2006. Here he was a skinny second year man, and if you're familiar with Euro wrestling you'll know that skinny means skinny. This was quite a decent bout and I thought Sanniez did a great job of keeping it tight. But again there was no finish, perhaps deliberately so to only upload part of the footage.

On 8/27/2024 at 12:35 AM, David Mantell said:

 

 

ALBERT Sanniez was going heel at this time and turning into a Jim Breaks style Horrid Little Man. Mercier was 20 years old and still had a TBWvibe to him, his kid brother Pierre even more so There's a definite feel of Jim Breaks Vs Danny Collins here with Mercier as the spectacular young whizzkid- all scisseax Volees,  crucifix/further nelson takedowns, reverse snapmare s and other flashy tricks - and Sanniez as the increasingly stroppy dirty wrestler getting shown up by the kid.

I guess the clip you watched cuts off the same point as this does.

This is my previous review of Mercier - Sanniez. I might write on a longer review as I recall it's quite a good technical mat h.

.No luck with Jones Vs Mercier, I shall have to do that from scratch..  

[ohtani's jacket]

Jones vs. Mercier wasn't very good. Marty seemed to lose a clip after the outstanding match against Bull Blitzer (Steve Wright) in '86. I don't think he was ever the same. I'm not a big fan of the Owen match, however, so YMMV. 

[David Mantell]

1 hour ago, ohtani's jacket said:

Jones vs. Mercier wasn't very good. Marty seemed to lose a clip after the outstanding match against Bull Blitzer (Steve Wright) in '86. I don't think he was ever the same. I'm not a big fan of the Owen match, however, so YMMV. 

I'll argue those. mainly the Mercier one, on the British thread when I get to them. The crowd take longer to warm to Mercier than to .Owen and both labour somewhat under Jones's rather jingoistic "Eng Er Land!!!" crowd working which is one thing against a heel like Finlay Bull Blitzer or Jean .Paul Auvert but a bit irritating in the case of Johnny Foreigner who happens to be a gentleman and a skilled technician like Owen or Marc.

[David Mantell]

The midget match first,  set at Alphaville a charity kids' establishment we've seen on here before.  The manager gets interviewed by Couderc. Cowboy Lang (dark hair, moustache) has a full nelson on, Tiny Tom (ot Teeny Tom as Couderc calls him) bouts his legs on the ropes. Delaporte calls for a break so Lang lets him drop.  This starts the first of many arguments between Tom and L'Arbitre.  Lang has Tom in a front facelock which Tom escapes somehow (between them the two Rogers prevent us seeing how - Delaporte obstructs the hard cam while Couderc calls away the shot for a while.). Tom slaps Delaporte while in a hold and really gets beaten up by the full grown referee.  The two stom each others hands and Tom gets into arguments with Delaporte.  This goes round round until Lang gets ejected to ringside. Lang sneaks to the other side, re-enters the ring and blindsides Tom with an atomic drop while he is still arguing with the ref (demanding a KO count).  Tom suplexes and cross presses Lang who kicks out at 2 , sending Tom flying into Delaporte who throws him back to Lang who kicks out at 2 leading to another Tom/Delaporte argument.  Tom eventually gets an Avertisement.  He gets tied I the ropes and Lang ducks through Delaporte's legs to get him.  Delaporte picks Tom up like a child to get him free.  Lang throws Tom outside. Back in,  Lang gets a rear legdive on Tom who kicks him into Delaporte's crotch, hurting him.  Tom gets a headlock, they go off the ropes and Lang uses the "something in the air" distraction spot to Manchette Tom.  This goes on far too long as Lang continues to convince Tom and the referee that something has fallen from the roof. They run the ropes, ducking each others charges until Tom's hand gets stamped on. More criss-cross until Lang gets an aeroplane spin and giddily gets the pin. They shake hands afterwards. It makes a change from stomping. Some kid gets interviewed between bouts.

Too much repetitive comedy.  There's only so many times you can find a hand being stamped amusing.