RE-POST: WAW Past, Present & Future (2004)

In 1993, Ricky Knight & Jimmy Ocean were far from happy men. As the legendary Superflys tag-team, they had reigned supreme as the British Tag-Team Champions since they defeated King Ben & Kid McCoy in Bristol in 1989. Along with their glamorous manager, the Sweet Saraya, they defeated all challengers to their titles.

But they were unhappy with the way that certain aspects of the wrestling business were being handled. In their opinion, hardly any promoters in Britain were putting on shows for the fans, they were in the business just to make some fast money. Knight, Ocean & Saraya knew the fans wanted more.

So, in 1993, they formed the World Association of Wrestling, in an attempt to rectify this situation.

Since 1989, the three of them had run regular training sessions at the Norwich Corn Exchange, holding these sessions before the regular All-Star shows at the venue. Having gained a degree of success in this venture, and growing unhappy with the direction of the wrestling business, the Superflys saw the setting up of their own promotion as a natural progression.

Having subcontracted holiday camp shows during their first few months as a company in 1993, WAW took their next step forward the following years. A capacity crowd filled The Talk nightclub in Norwich as WAW presented their first arena show, "The War of 94", featuring a mixture of up-and-coming stars and wrestling veterans. The show was a great success.

Over the next few years, WAW continued to run arena and holiday camp shows, as well as their regular training sessions before the All-Star shows in Norwich, but it was in 1997 that two significant events happened.

By 1997, audiences at the Corn Exchange were numbering under a hundred. Brian Dixon made the decision to pull All-Star out of Norwich. Knight, Ocean & Saraya saw their opportunity, and purchased the rights to the venue from Dixon. WAW finally had a home base where they could promote regular arena shows.

With the Corn Exchange now established as their new base, WAW formalised their Training Academy. Although a few big names, such as Hot Stuff & the Zebra Kid, had been trained in Norwich before, it was after 1997 that a great number of today's top stars were coming out of the academy. Those trained by Jimmy Ocean, Crusher Mason, Sweet Saraya & Tony Barron included the U.K. Pitbulls, Bash, Crash, Lee Maxx, and many, many more.

The Corn Exchange shows proved to be a boon for WAW. By holding fortnightly shows in the same venue, they were able to build up regular, solid story lines, again using a mixture of up-and-coming stars and established veterans. British wrestling greats such as Skull Murphy, Danny Boy Collins, Tony Barron, Crusher Mason, and more were regulars at the Corn Exchange. Up-and-comers such as Alex Shane, Jonny Storm & Jody Fleisch earned their first wages as professional wrestlers while working for WAW, and former WWF stars such as Earthquake graced the Corn Exchange ring. A venue that Brian Dixon had written off was thriving under the WAW promotional banner.

But as the saying goes, all good things must come to an end. Having gained a strong following with their regular shows there, and having launched such traditions as October Outrage there, in 2000 the local authorities closed the Norwich Corn Exchange down. WAW held their last show there in December of that year. A short time later, the building was demolished.

But it wasn't all bad news in 2000, as WAW secured the lucrative Pontins holiday camp contract. While continuing to promote regular shows in the East Anglia area, they also held shows on the Pontins circuit all over Britain.

The loss of the Corn Exchange, although a big blow for the company, pushed WAW towards their next goal. Although they had already received a great deal of exposure in the local and national press, WAW, and Ricky Knight in particular, had a dream, to promote a British super card using mainly British talent.

And so the build-up to one of the biggest events in British wrestling history began. Fightmare was announced for the Norwich Sport Village in March 2001. In interviews for the local and national press, Knight told of his desire to get British wrestling back on to national television.

What a lot of people don't realise is just how close Knight came to realising his dream. Having been in negotiations with Sky Sports for a number of weeks, Knight signed a contract with Sky on the evening of the Fightmare show in April 2001. With 2,000 fans filling the Sport Village, hundreds of more turned away, and many of Britain's top wrestling stars in the locker room, things looked great.

With a bill of forty wrestlers, and eleven matches, Fightmare proved to be a great success critically. In the age of the world wide web, the fact that WAW was able to draw a 2,000 sell-out crowd, without widespread promotion on the Internet, says a lot not only for WAW as a company, but for the fact that wrestling fans can still be drawn to a show with a promise of solid wrestling action, and although Fightmare was a critical success, there was a downside to the whole situation.

Problems with the production company hired to film the show meant that the final product that was submitted to Sky was far below the standards of production the television company demanded. To say that Ricky, his family and everyone connected with WAW were gutted would be an understatement. They had literally poured their hearts and souls into Fightmare, only for a production company claiming to have experience it did not possess to destroy their dream.

Having lost a great deal of money over the Fightmare project, the company could have ended there and then, but it didn't. Everyone picked themselves up, continued with their Pontins commitments, and continued to run regular arena shows, returning to the Sport Village six months later and drawing a near 1,000 crowd with October Outrage.

The end of 2001 saw the first appearance of a bona-fide American wrestling legend in WAW, as Jake "The Snake" Roberts made his first appearance before a packed crowd at the Waveney Sports Centre in Lowestoft. Roberts became a regular part of the WAW roster.

As well as promoting regular shows in Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex, WAW returned to their roots by promoting regular shows at The Talk in Norwich. These shows in particular were very successful for the company. The hard-core match pitting Klondyke Kate against Sweet Saraya for the WAW World Women's title is regarded as one of WAW's greatest matches ever, not just by the fans, but by Kate & Saraya as well. However, attempts to promote shows outside of their "territory", in places such as the North-East and Cornwall met with limited success.

One place WAW had some new success with was the Internet. In 2001 they launched their official web site, which has since gone on to become one of the most successful in Britain as far as professional wrestling goes. While the company doesn't rely on the web to further angles and story lines, it does realise that the Internet is a vital part of it's promotional machine. Through it's web site, WAW have gained a fan following in countries such as America, mainland Europe, Japan and the Middle-East.

While 2003 saw some arenas continuing to pull in good crowds, (Norwich and Lowestoft in particular), and other arena attendances beginning to dwindle, new venues were sought. April of last year saw WAW promote their first show at the Town Hall in Hunstanton, and the venue continues to draw strong crowds today.

Early 2004 saw Ricky Knight finally realise a dream. After nearly three years of heartache and trouble, Fightmare was finally released on DVD in it's original, intended form, in two parts. With top-notch production, the release was a great success. Those fans who were not in attendance that night have commented on how great the show was. Many of the Internet fans were surprised by the production qualities of the DVD. Having written off WAW as nothing more than a small-time regional promotion, they now realise that WAW is one of the best wrestling promotions in Britain today.

So what does the future hold for the World Association of Wrestling? The Training Academy, under the guidance of Sweet Saraya, continues to produce some of Britain's top wrestling stars, men and women who go on to great success not just in WAW, but for other promotions in Britain and abroad. To list each and every star that has come through the academy would take too long.

As a company, WAW continues to put on strong, solid wrestling shows that win high praise from the fans, and with a solid fan base in place, there are plans to hold a second super card, Fightmare II, sometime in the future.

But it doesn't stop there. Preliminary discussions have taken place with several wrestling promotions in America and Japan, with regards to talent exchange programs. WAW have also held talks with several television companies, not just in Britain, but in Europe as well, and while these talks are in the early stages at the moment, it looks like the WAW product could be appearing on a television near you sometime soon, and with big shows coming up in Lowestoft, Great Yarmouth, and Hunstanton, as well as the regular shows on the Pontins holiday camp circuit, things are certainly looking up at the moment.

The World Association of Wrestling has been in existence for ten years. Behind Brian Dixon's All-Star, and John Freemantle's Premier Promotions, it's the third oldest wrestling company in Britain today. With a strong foundation, and a great team making sure that fans get what they want, great wrestling action, WAW looks like it will be around for years to come, long after many of the upstart promotions that appear in Britain on a regular basis. The future does indeed look bright.