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    5 Star Wrestling: All Shows Cancelled – Company Desolved

    TWMWrestlingBy Updated:6 Mins Read

    5 Star Wrestling launched their latest UK tour on February 1, 2018, airing on FreeSportsUK and, after only 5 weeks on the air, have announced they will no longer promote shows.

    The UK based promotion, 5 Star Wrestling has announced today they will close down with immediate effect. A statement put out on Twitter read:

    It is with great sadness that we announce that there will be no more 5 Star Wrestling events. Fans need to contact their point of purchase for refunds. Pro Wrestling UK Ltd, the company running the events has been shut down. We’re sorry to all involved.

    5 Star Wrestling launched in 2016, promoting shows in large arenas. Their shows drew poorly, with no more than 1,000 fans in attendance at any one time. For any independent promotion, this would have been considered a success, but for a promotion who booked 15,000+ seater arenas, this was seen as a failure.

    They returned in 2017, advertising another full UK arena tour in big cities such as Newcastle, Aberdeen, Sheffield and Belfast, a 128-man tournament, and sensationally offered former WWE Superstar CM Punk $1million for an appearance, garnering a big response in the media. Of course, this was no more than a publicity stunt and not only did CM Punk not appear on any shows, he did not even acknowledge the offer.

    More bad news would occur for 5 Star Wrestling as their entire much-promoted 2017 tour was postponed before it even began. The promotion officially cited the Manchester Terrorist Attack in May as the reason for cancellation, quoting “safety concerns”, however industry insiders, and a source close to 5 Star Wrestling confirmed the real reason was the tour was failing to sell in the numbers they had hoped.

    Of course, when that news got out to the fans, the response was hugely negative. Unhappy that a terrorist attack had been used as an excuse to cancel a poorly selling tour, fans vented on social media.

    5 Star Would get an opportunity and a lifeline in the form of a live television deal. Early in 2018, 5 Star Wrestling announced they would resume their postponed tour, and several weeks later, FreeSportsUK (which itself had just launched) announced it would be carrying 5 Star Wrestling on a weekly basis.

    Reaction in the British Wrestling scene was, unfortunately, largely negative. Their previous cancellations, poor history of promoting shows, and lack of communication with its customers, caused fans and industry insiders to vent their frustration, feeling there were many promotions much more successful and much more deserving of a national television platform.

    FreeSportsUK stuck by 5 Star Wrestling, however, promising a game-changing tour, massive sell-out live weekly shows and that “they were building a brand for the future”

    When their first show finally aired on February 1 2018 in Liverpool, it was largely met with a negative response. Technical issues riddled the broadcast, fans complained that every wrestler had the same entrance music and entrance video and that UK talent was overlooked in favour of “WWE stars who hadn’t been at the top of their game in a long time”. The in-ring product was of a decent quality, but the lack of atmosphere at the shows was obvious to see. Empty seats very visible on camera, as again, despite being live across the UK on TV, their shows failed to sell more than 1,000 tickets to any one show.

    The technical issues continued on, and it became clear that a promotion with no previous experience of running televised shows was struggling. Their website had not been updated since 2017, and the promotion garnered a poor reputation for customer service and communication with its fans.

    4 shows in, 5 Star Wrestling announced it would be taking a 2-week hiatus from FreeSportsUK. Unfortunately, it would never return.

    During the 2 week hiatus period, one of their ex-WWE signees, Rey Mysterio, appeared to walk out on 5 Star Wrestling. The promotion announced it had “not heard from Rey Mysterio but insisted he would be at the Manchester show” and 5 Star also announced on March 8, their biggest UK wrestler, Zack Gibson, would be leaving the promotion as it was strongly rumoured he had signed for WWE’s UK brand.

    The news of the closure of 5 Star Wrestling was first leaked as a post from the promotions’ private Facebook group surfaced, with promoter Dan Hinkles stating:

    Last night at 4pm, Jason informed me that we would be closing the wrestling promotion down, with all future shows being cancelled. By 8pm we had put in place a plan to run Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham and Aberdeen. That plan has since fallen by the wayside, so here we are.

    He goes on to say…

    The Plymouth show was a great sign of the things we could have done, but unfortunately it wasn’t meant to be. I am truly sorry this didn’t work out. 

    Wrestlers, promoters, and fans on social media began to react to the news of the promotions’ closure:

    TWM News has reached out to representatives of both 5 Star Wrestling and FreeSportsUK for statements, however as of the time of writing we have yet to receive a response from either party.

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