Backstage News On Big Plans For WWE UK, Superstars Sign New Deals, Rumors On WWE Signings, More
WWE is moving forward with their UK project, according to The Wrestling Observer Newsletter. There has been a lot of recent movement behind-the-scenes after several delays with the project.
WWE will be returning to the UK in December of this year for another round of live events. They have dates booked for Margate and Kent, and may have others booked. It should be noted that WWE has had a lot of dates booked for UK TV tapings in the past but they were quietly canceled. WWE previously held the UK Title tournament in January 2017 from Blackpool, England. This is where Tyler Bate was crowned the inaugural WWE UK Champion. They then held a follow-up to the tournament in May 2017 from Norwich, England. That event saw Bate retain over Mark Andrews in the finals. Current UK Champion Pete Dunne worked both events – losing to Bate in the finals of the tournament and defeating Trent Seven to become the #1 contender at the next event.
The idea for the UK expansion is still to do tapings for local programming, and likely WWE Network programming, and run a UK-based promotion. They also want to open up a UK Performance Center down the road with the idea of bringing UK trainers to the main WWE Performance Center in Orlando to teach them how WWE wants talents trained, and then have the UK trainers run the facility.
WWE has also renewed contracts of the key UK talents, who they consider the "big five" of the group – UK Champion Pete Dunne, Mark Andrews, Tyler Bate, Trent Seven and Wolfgang. It's believed that these talents signed for better deals with at least one of them going from $20,000 to $50,000.
WWE has also signed top UK indie talent Zack Gibson for the UK project, not for WWE NXT. Gibson has been told what promotions he can still work for and which ones he can't work for. There's also rumors going around the UK indie scene that say top Scottish talent Joe Coffey has signed a deal for WWE's UK project, according to The Observer. Coffey has denied the talk.
Source: Wrestling Observer Newsletter
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