Attitude Pro Wrestling’s 2024 season starts on January 19th with their ‘Ruggy Rumble’ event to crown the first APW Champion. So with that in mind I’ve headed to the YouTube to watch the promotions first event ‘Ruggy Mania’ which took place May last year in Rutherglen.

I spoke to The Wanderer on the SWN Podcast on the run up to this show where he was very passionate on making the first event in his venture to be the biggest and best possible.

Was it? I’ll tell you what I thought anyway…

Triple Threat – Meyhem Brooks defeated Robbie Cardwell, and Leyton Buzzard by submission.

Leyton Buzzard carried himself like an absolute superstar in the open flurries, the crowd were electric for his entrance and his every move. There’s little wonder why he’s done so well with his subsequent trip to Japan and all his other successes elsewhere.

Brooks played spoiler, opting to bully Robbie Cardwell and making sure Buzzard couldn’t get involved. Slowly down the pace by grabbing a limb and striking.

Once Buzzard got back in though, he went to town. A 619? Sure. A double stack Samoan Drop? Let’s go.

Just as it looked like Buzzard was about to win with a pop up sit out powerbomb to Robbie Cardwell, Meyhem returned to throw Leyton out and slap on a rear naked choke to finish the job.

A blistering opener with a lot happening in a short space of time. It still had plenty of flow though with very little downtime.

Leyton Buzzard man. We know he has a performance background which makes his confidence to express his emotions and actions so evident. Everything he did was perfect for the crowd, they were engaged in his plight to get back into the match and when he did they were riding the Buzzard train (wings?) all the way. When Brooks threw him out in the conclusion he became public enemy number one.

He brought his opponents up to his level, Robbie Cardwell had a great showing, and this was possibly the best heel performance I’ve seen from Meyhem Brooks.

A great match to start the show.

Over The Top Rope Invitational Battle Royal – Winner: Stan The Slav

The ring filled up with a cavalcade of wrestlers, from Judas Grey, Monstrum, Jason Hyde, to The Pack, Lee MacRae, and receiving a solo entrances, Stan The Slav, SBX, and The Govan Team. All vying for a shot at the Source Wrestling Championship later on in the show.

Pure and utter chaos in the opening with bodies being thrown out left and right. We got Monstrum donking Matt Daly with an inflatable hammer. Zander enlisted children from the crowd to try and push him back into the ring to avoid elimination. Alliances made, and quickly broken.

It took six men to eventually get Monstrum over the top rope as the field started to narrow with The Pack and The Govan Team squaring off leaving Stan The Slav recovering in the corner. JTT and Wrex dispatched Steg and Zander to leave Stan at a numbers disadvantage. A little miscommunication saw Wrex collide into JTT for Stan to dump them both out to win.

Source Wrestling Champion Stone Malone cut the celebration short by spearing Stan before putting him in a Torture Rack.

It was a busy and messy battle royal, lots happening and hard to keep track of. Popular winner, with SBX the MVP as he always seemed to be conniving about and getting little digs in when he could.

Nicole Jasmin defeated Rubi Roberts by pinfall.

Roberts quickly put Jasmin into an ankle lock but Nicole kicked out of it. A little back and forth with Roberts going back to the ankle when the opportunity arose.

Jasmin fought back but her second cartwheel elbow was caught for a German Suplex. Roberts got Nicole up for a fireman’s carry but she wriggled out for a sunset flip pin for the win outta nowhere.

A quick match. Jasmin’s reaction timing seemed to be a little off whether it was too fast or too slow in moments which made things look clunky. She also shook off the ankle attack with no effects after the bell. Just a little thing.

The match was fine. Roberts was roundly hated, and happy to goad more boos, which made the eruption when Jasmin scored the pinfall loud.

Lou King Sharp w/The Big Strong Man vs Frankie Richards ended in a no contest.

Before the match started Lou King Sharp and The Big Strong Man riled up the crowd something rotten which saw BSM getting absolutely battered with inflatable hammers at ringside, the kids were merciless.

After a bit of yay-boo, Sharp jumped Richards in the corner for a bit of a brawl which headed into the crowd before finally getting back to the ring. Richards went up to the top rope but BSM got involved and he put the boots to Richards before being joined by Sharp.

Ravie Davie made the save which lead to…

Frankie Richards & Ravie Davie defeated Lou King Sharp & The Big Strong Man by pinfall.

Davie was flip, flop, and flying his way around Sharp and BSM, but even he found himself being thrown about by The Big Strong Man. A 3D to Sharp wasn’t enough with BSM breaking up the fall, but a big tackle from Richards took BSM out and leaving Sharp prey for a big Spinebuster from Richards before being finished with a Lionsault from Davie.

The crowd was nuts for Frankie Richards, the hometown lad, and then they went unglued for Ravie Davie’s second appearance of the show. The match itself, as far as moves go, was basic but it maximised the crowd reactions and it made a wild bout off the back of the sound alone.

The Big Strong Man played buffoon really well with his wee shrieks to check on Lou after a pasting, or enduring the inflatable hammer symphony. Lou King Sharp is one of the best at reading a crowd to make the reactions be natural and from the soul.

There was a bit towards the end with Sharp at the top rope, and he was there for ages jaw jacking with the crowd which gave his opponent ample time to recover and roll out of the way of a splash. He just makes it look easy to merge great character work with logical match progression.

Frankie Richards looked solid, had the crowd behind him 100%, and looked to thrive on that reaction. There was nothing fancy about his moveset, but there didn’t need to be. Every time I see Ravie Davie wrestle it convinces me that he is the people’s hero in Scottish wrestling, especially to kids hopped up on sugar and Prime, he ended it by getting the crowd to chant Frankie’s name before throwing their opponents out of the ring to a chorus of cheers and laughter as Sharp slipped on some spilled liquid at ringside.

Three Way Dance – Termination Z (Big Ross Hauser & Daro) defeated KoE (Adam King & Marcus King), and Legends Never Die (Fulton King & Sami Sparx) by pinfall.

This one started hot with KoE knocking Termination Z off the apron before Adam King had his head taken off from a Fulton King spinning wheel kick over the top rope. The whiplash from that was outstanding.

After a bit of stalemate back and forth with Termination Z and Legends Never Die, Adam King blind tagged himself in only to be met with a different limb from Fulton King, his arm this time, for a big clothesline. Fulton’s beef with Adam continued later on when he threw him for a German Suplex like a wet tracksuit.

Big Ross hit KoE with a double chokeslam, Sami Sparx followed up with a Swanton Bomb onto Adam King, and at this point I realised it was a three way dance as KoE were eliminated.

A couple competitive minutes followed, Legends Never Die had a great step up uppercut tandem move that got an audible ‘ohhhh’ from the crowd when it connected with Daro. After a kick out from Termination Z’s Hart Attack variation, Sparx couldn’t get up from a Big Ross lariat followed by a Frog Splash from Daro.

Big hugs after the match between the two final teams.

Fact, this match had 50% Kings in it. I never said it was a fun fact but worth pointing out nonetheless.

We got a good amount of tag team offense, which you would hope when it’s three teams that are established as tag teams. I loved the chaotic energy that Legends Never Die provided, we got some nice counters from Sami Sparx including a powerbomb counter which saw Sparx headscissor KoE into each other. When Fulton got in it just kicked up a gear as he swung wildly hoping to catch someone in the crossfire of fists.

Termination Z and Legends Never Die complimented each other well in the final portion of the match. I felt like Big Ross hesitated a little bit too often to wait for a crowd response before hitting big moves, not enough to break the flow completely but there was some buffering. Overall though, all six put in a good shift to provide some sports entertainment.

Source Wrestling Championship – Stone Malone defeated Stan The Slav by submission to retain the Source Wrestling Championship.

There were immediate boos for Stone Malone as he entered first, the smug look said it all as he strutted to the ring with his belt in hand. Despite holding his ribs, it didn’t stop Stan going for a double leg takedown as soon as the bell rang.

Malone used his power to get the upper hand, targeting the ribs of Stan with bearhugs and shoulder charges into the corner, and catching an airborne Stan to punish him with a backbreaker across Stone’s knee.

Stan used all five rules of dodgeball to create some space, hoisting Malone up for a fireman’s carry flapjack for a near fall. Malone managed to hit a big spear but Stan got a shoulder up as he valiantly tried to hang on. Stan ducked a discus lariat attempt and hit Malone with a reverse Twist of Fate and got the three count! The boyhood dream has come true!

But…

The champions foot was draped over the bottom rope.

The referee reviewed the footage, VAR in action, and restarted the match.

Malone quickly hit a discus lariat but when Stan kicked out, immediately lifted him up into the Torture Rack for the submission.

This was a journey of dizzying highs and heart breaking lows, in the context of the emotions during the match. After his actions following the conclusion of the battle royal, Stone Malone was soundly hated in Rutherglen and the audience wanted Stan make him pay.

I really liked how this wasn’t treated as a sportsmanlike contest, because it shouldn’t have been. Stan got assaulted without warning and was desperate to gain some revenge, the ultimate being taking the Source Wrestling Championship from Stone Malone. You felt the desperation from Stan, but also the apathy fading from Malone as the match continued on.

A simple story, plucky hero trying to overcome the villain, but on this occasion evil triumphed.

The Wanderer defeated Saqib Ali by pinfall.

The Wanderer received a heroes welcome when he made his way out from behind the curtain. There was nothing to fear as The Wanderer was here, as the crowd chanted his name but the sing-along was cut short with Saqib Ali on the attack.

After withstanding the opening assault, The Wanderer battled back but as it looked like it was coming up Wanderer, Ali exited the ring to reset, going as far as going behind the curtain which lead The Wanderer to wander back to retrieve his opponent.

Following a journey around ringside and getting slapped by a gaggle of kids, Ali started taking more shortcuts to maintain an advantage, like pushing the referee into the ropes to put The Wanderer off balance on the top turnbuckle, and slowing down the pace with a chinlock.

Wanderer fought back with a kick being caught with Ali sending the foot into the stomach of the referee and while they were double over Ali proceeded to low blow The Wanderer. The referee then low blowed Saqib Ali. I didn’t like this spot at all. So in all logic here, Ali threw Wanderers foot away which hit the referee in the stomach by accident, then the low blow happened right in front of the referee (we’ll say that her eyes were closed reacting to the stomach kick because that’s a straight disqualification otherwise), so the next step here is for the referee to low blow someone, who by all accounts, did nothing wrong if the referee didn’t see the low blow. Then all three fell over in unison. Terrible.

We’ll move past that as Ali and Wanderer traded fists and uppercuts with The Wanderer getting the upper hand. Ali caught him in a crossface but Wanderer managed to hold on and bounced back with an rKo outta nowhere but it could only garner a two count.

THEN The Wanderer was sent into the referee in the corner who barely reacted, just held their shoulder, to turn into ANOTHER low blow in direct vision of the referee who STILL didn’t call for the bell. Saqib then just knocked out the ref mid-count because clearly there’s no rules here. Ali hit Wanderer with a chair but the referee was knocked out and couldn’t count. He probably could’ve used the chair without the referee being knocked out with how it was going so far…

So The Wanderer kicked out, and picked up a running Saqib for an Attitude Adjustment to get the win.

This had too much. Yes the crowd were going banana for the outcome, but there were sections that didn’t need to happen. That first low blow thing was so contrived and was made to look all the more worse with the second low blow moment. The second could’ve been solved with the referee looking away, or selling being ran into by falling to the ground. The first just defied all logic and could’ve just been a clothesline collision to create a pause in the match as it didn’t play into the outcome of the match itself.

Despite that, like I said, the crowd went wild for the outcome, the hometown boy done good. All my picking here is after the fact and with the beauty of hindsight. Had I been in the crowd running off the emotions and atmosphere I might’ve looked passed it.

There were some great matches and standout performances with the two three way matches providing the best in terms of wrestling, with the follow up to the battle royal being played nicely into the championship match to get the emotional juices flowing. An easy watch overall, a packed venue, a crowd that was up for reacting and being part of the show. The insanity of a couple moments in the main event didn’t hamper my enjoyment of the event as a whole. For a debut show especially, they provided a good night for the paying audience.