SAM BAILEY v CHRIS RIDGEWAY:
The opening match saw not just the Futureshock coaches collide but also the fourth edition of this thrilling rivalry between Sam Bailey and Chris Ridgeway, with Bailey holding the head-to-head record with a 2-1 series lead. This rivalry started in October at the Bumps in the Night show when both men teamed up to face the rookie tag team of The ‘05 where Bailey was none too happy with how his fellow coach Chris Ridgeway was towards his youngster opponents. After Ridgeway was pinned to see the duo lose, we nearly saw both Futureshock coaches come to blows after the match. Since then though, both men have cost the other victories. Firstly, Sam interfered during Ridgeway’s match with Big Dec McCarthy before Bailey lost his triple threat match and got pinned after seeing the music and entrance video of his rival playing to distract him.
This match set the tone for the whole night, as both men looked to out-wrestle their opponent while also resorting to just kicking the crap out of each other. If you were asked who you thought would be the aggressor and more vicious in the contest, you would have bet your money on Ridgeway, but surprisingly it was Bailey. The normally easy-going Sam Bailey sent some strong kicks and chops towards Ridgeway where Chris took his lumps, and brushed them off like they were nothing. We then saw an arsenal of holds and kicks by Ridgeway which turned the contest into a case of top trumps, over who could withstand the blows. This was a bruising and technical encounter that went back and forth where a Brainbuster and kick kept Bailey down for a Ridgeway win, and more importantly levelled the head-to-head record at 2-2.
After the match, it saw someone wearing an eye patch jumping Sam Bailey from behind and choking him with a coat, with the attacker being Big Dec McCarthy who hasn’t been seen since breaking his orbit bone at the hands of Chris Ridgeway last time out in Stockport. The Ulsterman was choking the PC coach out until Ridgeway ran back out to intervene and make the save with McCarthy exiting sharpish.
THE HORDE ( Jack Nomac & Seraphim) vs THE ‘05
After The ‘05 defeated Solomon and Gorgon of The Horde earlier in the first show, the remaining members of Jack Nomac and Seraphim looked to avenge their fellow group members’ loss by levelling things up in the evening. Harvey Jukes came out with his ribs taped up after a beating earlier in the day, yet the tape was a massive target for the Horde to focus on. It saw Henry and Jukes having the better of things early doors with Nomac and Seraphim regrouping to take control of the match, with the tape being ripped off the body of Jukes in no time. Unfortunately for the two youngsters, this was not to be a clean sweep of wins over The Horde, as it saw Jukes getting involved with Gorgon who was down at ringside and saw him spitting the black mist in Jukes’ eyes that blinded him and saw Seraphim and Nomac hitting a double team to take the win.
HOLLIE BARLOW v LANA AUSTIN – Last Woman Standing Match:
We saw a grudge match between the ‘Hot Topic’ Hollie Barlow squaring off against the ‘Queen of Mean’ Lana Austin in a Last Woman Standing match, as this rivalry which began five years ago when Austin turned on her former best friend to steal the Women’s title from her. But Barlow returned to the ring over the 20th Anniversary weekend, to which Hollie has proved to be a thorn in the side of Lana and cost her a few matches. These two traded shots even before the bell even rang for the start, as both just looked to inflict pain and damage on their opponent early on, where the first big highlight saw Lana having Hollie upside down in the corner for the tree of woe, before resting a chair up against her head and two-footing the chair. Austin then beat down Barlow more before attempting to use a Bowling ball on her foe but Hollie stopped any attempted use of the object. For the most part, Lana Austin was in control After she set a chair between the ropes in the corner, Hollie then sent Lana crashing into it as Barlow launched her comeback in the contest, firstly putting a trash can on her opponent and taking a Kendo stick to it, before going coast to coast with the bin played on who has propped up Lana on the ropes.
With two chairs being opened up near the corner it saw Hollie Barlow attempting to suplex her foe through them both, however, Lana escaped and dropped down underneath her to powerbomb Barlow through the two chairs. Austin then followed it up by spearing Hollie through a wooden table, but the ‘Hot Topic’ of Futureshock refused to stay down and saw her getting up and would land the deciding blow in the contest to have the referee counting to ten and awarding the win to Hollie Barlow. After a hard-hitting battle between these tough women, Barlow pulled Austin in for a quick embrace with her former best friend, so maybe this rivalry has finally seen a truce between the two.
SCOTT OBERMAN (atomic champ) v TEDDY REAY (adrenaline champ) ‘TITLE VS TITLE’ Atomic & Futureshock Adrenaline titles:
If the Last Woman Standing match wasn’t brutal enough, then some may have seen that encounter as a prelude to the brutality we saw for both, the Atomic and Futureshock Adrenaline Championships. Both men squared off against each other just five days before in Liverpool at the Azvex Brewery, as at Atomic – Nuclear Winter, it saw the ‘Real Thing’ Scott Oberman retaining his Atomic championship with a hard-fought win over ‘the Rat King’ in a tough battle. The following days saw the announcement that both Oberman and Reay would fight again, only this time it would be a Title VS Title match and have Reay being the one with the ‘home field advantage’ so to speak, as he was the Futureshock Adrenaline title holder.
To say this match was hard-hitting would be the biggest understatement of the year, as the action from the opening bell saw both adopting technical and strong style wrestling with Oberman inflicting far more damage on his fellow North West Strong opponent than Reay and was in full control. Oberman made full use of punishing an already battered and sore Reay, with the Adrenaline champion struggling to generate much momentum against a dominant Atomic champion in Scott. Teddy then managed to reverse a back suplex in mid-air to land down on top of Oberman for a two count, before taking some of the loudest and hardest chops to the chest with Reay proving to be a fighting champion.
We then saw a crazy couple of minutes where Scott went to hit his tombstone piledriver on Reay, only to see Teddy rolling out of it to reverse it into a near fall and follow it up with a Fisherman’s suplex that unfortunately, he was forced to release at two, due to the pain going through him. The brutality that Teddy Reay took across both matches took its toll on him, as the Atomic champion would rip the Futureshock Adrenaline championship away from his rival and make it 4-0, or as he pointed out on social media afterwards, if you include the Lotto Thunder win it’s 5-0.
LILY WINTER © v VIOLET NYTE – Futureshock Women’s Championship
In recent times, it has the champion defending her title against top tough opponents in Helen Charlotte Campbell and Lucy Sky, where her third title defence would be up against the debuting Violet Nyte from the Black Country, and a very stern test for Miss Winter. It saw the challenger taking the early advantage and putting the champion into trouble, with Winter facing an onslaught from her opponent. However, Lily yanked the foot of Nyte and saw her fall off the ropes, and take an awful landing in the corner. The move proved effective for the champion, and Winter was more than happy to take the boos and chants from the fans, as she was now in total control of the contest. Winter kept her opponent grounded and seemed to embrace the boos her way while Nyte tried to mount a comeback.
The Black County native forced her way back into the contest and took it to the champion and on the front foot, with the momentum shifting back to the challenger. Unfortunately for Nyte, Lily showed why she is the best in the Women’s division right now, as she hoisted her opponent up for the Cold Shoulder, despite not getting all of it, the impact was still enough to keep her down for the 1-2-3. As the fallen challenger made her way to the back, it saw the Futureshock faithful clapping and chanting “Please come back” so fingers crossed we see a return from her in a FutureShock ring again.
JOEY HAYES v TONY WRIGHT v DEADLY DAMON LEIGH v JACK JOHNSON – Futureshock Tournament FINAL: FATAL 4 WAY
Main event time saw the climax of the 2024 Futureshock Tournament with Jack Johnson, Tony Wright, Joey Hayes and Deadly Damon Leigh all looking to get that big opportunity of a guaranteed title shot of their choosing, be it the Tag Team, Adrenaline or Heavyweight championships. Former champion Joe Blazr came out to the ring, having suffered defeat at the hands of Wright earlier in the qualifying matches, with Joe still claiming to be friends with Tony Wright and yet saw Tony wanting nothing to do with him, going as far to gesture to everyone in the ring that he had nothing to do with him.
After Hayes and Wright got the better of both Leigh and Johnson at the start, we saw the two trading moves back and forth in the ring, before they were thrown to the outside. We were then left with Damon Leigh and Jack Johnson in the ring, as they had a mini stare-down before deciding that the best course of action was for them to work together in the match and have them both vacate the ring and attack their opponents. The alliance saw them setting up chairs and placing their opponents upright to boot in the face, however, Hayes and Wright both moved out of the way and saw them trying the same method and proved successful.
The partnership with Leigh & Johnson seemed to grow stronger the longer the match went on, as it felt more like a handicap match than a four-way. After the fan favourites were worn down, the partnership between Damon Leigh and Jack Johnson began to dissolve after the Deadly One stopped Johnson’s pin attempt with Leigh claiming it was his match to win. Tony Wright then looked odds on to win the tournament after hitting a Pedigree on Johnson, however, just as the hand was coming down from referee James Greenwood to make it three, Joe Blazr jumped in the ring and stopped the hand from hitting the mat to deny ‘The Leading Man’ victory. Both men stared at each other before noticing the loose metal pipe that Jack Johnson brought to the ring, where Blazr gained control of it and struck Tony to knock him out. Blazr left the ring to chants of ‘Joe Traitor’ meanwhile the aftermath saw Joey Hayes winning the match and becoming the Futureshock Tournament winner for 2024.
The celebrations were cut short by last year’s tournament winner and Heavyweight champion Connor Patrick Reilly, as ‘the Genius’ came out to congratulate Joey Hayes on his win, before explaining what avenues Hayes had available to him. One option was to go down the route of the Tag titles and bring back Danny Hope to see the return of ‘The Models’ and go for a fourth tag team title run. Or secondly, go for the Adrenaline championship, a title that Joey held for a record 393 days as champion. But the fans and Hayes himself alluded to the third option, that being a heavyweight title shot, but Reilly laughed at the thought of ever being hit by the JKO and uttered the immortal line “You’ll NEVER hit the JKO on me!”…to which Hayes proceeded to hit the JKO on him. The Futureshock faithful then begged Joey to “Cash it in” and saw the tournament winner looking like he was going to do it, but left the ring and to make his way to the back. But Hayes then thought about it and saw him slide back into the ring to cash in his newly won trophy before hitting a couple more JKOs on the champion to win his FIRST-EVER Futureshock Heavyweight title and add his name to the Grand Slam club.