This was supposed to be a straightforward review of True Grit Wrestling’s “Jacob’s Ladder” event last weekend in Leeds.

You know the script by now; we go through the matches, there’s some attempt at dissecting the reasoning for certain issues or choices, we buzz off professional wrestling and there might even be a couple of jokes in there to keep things ticking along. 

It’s ten minutes or so of free reading that hopefully makes good use of your time and potentially encourages you to seek out a show or a particular wrestler.

I always want to do justice to the wonderful world of professional wrestling, warts and all.

Yet, when I finished the initial review of this show, I didn’t feel like I’d done True Grit justice. Simply going through the matches doesn’t celebrate True Grit in the way that it deserves. It’s a company that is more than just the matches. Any wrestling promotion can put on matches. Not every promotion has an identity. 

It doesn’t take a genius to put Wrestler A against Wrestler B for a “banger” match. It’s not even a bad thing, everyone likes a good wrestling match but that can only take you so far because there is so much on offer for fans. To carve out your place in independent wrestling, you need an identity and True Grit Wrestling has that in spades. 

Left Bank Leeds, a former church building that now serves as a home for a range of cultural and community events, is True Grit’s stunning home base outside of the city centre and community is where this all has to start. 

Away from the fact that the venue had a great variety of draught, bottled and soft drinks on offer at the bar including their own in-house lager, that there was made-to-order pizza available, that the sight lines and aesthetics made for a fantastic fan experience once the show started and the Wi-Fi signal was incredible (if you care about that), the most apparent and important thing was the sense of community in the venue. 

From the moment I walked in, it felt like wandering into a family party. If there wasn’t a wrestling ring in the middle of the room, I would’ve wondered if I’d made a wrong turn. People of all ages and backgrounds were chatting, laughing and one family was even passing out little Ugandan flags to show support for crowd favourite Nsereko (more on him later). 

That mix of ages and backgrounds, with families, groups of mates, students, metalheads and everyone else there were in harmony.

True Grit don’t explicitly market themselves as a family friendly show, with a ladder match in the main event, but everyone respected the fact that there were kids there. You don’t have to say cunt all the time to get your point across as a fan, if you know what I mean you…cunt? Sorry. 

That broad audience was reflected in ring announcer Bobby Cash and how he guided the show along.

He wasn’t grandstanding. He wasn’t doing the tired, edgy “I actually wanted to be a stand up comedian” routine nor was he pretending to be down the holiday camp giving it “I need you to be louder” shouting his head off. It was *just right* for this audience. 

Onto the in-ring side of things because after all, you can have pizza, craft beer and old churches, but without the wrestling itself, you’re hollow and it’s in the ring where the true spirit of True Grit resides.

It is proper pro wrestling for the modern day underpinned by stories that the crowd are invested in and great action wrapped in a professional package. 

The opener did an excellent job of laying the table for the evening as Nathan Black took on Cheeseburger of ROH and New Japan fame.

Black told the crowd about how years previously, he’d jetted off to Philadelphia with not much more than a dream, knocked on the door of the ROH dojo and was greeted by Cheeseburger, who would go on to train Black, invite him into his home and the two forged a friendship. 

Black explained how he and Cheeseburger had travelled the States together for wrestling, how his mentor had helped to shape the performer we were seeing tonight, about how Cheeseburger had taken part in some of the biggest shows in wrestling and that Black owed his career to him. 

As Cheeseburger lapped up the appreciation from the crowd, Black sneak attacked him because of course he did. Nathan Black is not a good guy. He is, however, a very entertaining bad guy. 

If a budding promoter ever asked my advice, one of the first things I’d say is every opening match should look similar to this. Clear cut good vs. bad guy to get the crowd warmed up and ready for a night of wrestling.

Make them “ooh and aah” as Cheeseburger did here with his old school mat-based offence, stoke the fires with skullduggery to kickstart the booing like Black did as he taunted his former mentor before having them rally round the good guy. 

Black got the full baddy bingo win as he low blowed ‘Burger, rolled him up and used the ropes to secure the pinfall to a chorus of boos though he did get his comeuppance immediately with a big strike from Cheeseburger. 

While that was a bell-to-bell story neatly wrapped in a bow, the stretch of the show until the interval was centered around ongoing storylines, some months in the making. 

I hadn’t actually watched a single match from True Grit before “Jacob’s Ladder” but I felt clued in to the goings on thanks to the company’s social media output both internally and from the wrestlers involved.

Wrestling can be as easy or as hard as you want to make it. A little effort goes a long way. 

True Grit owner JC came to the ring at the request of Bobby Cash to address the crowd due to his previous actions when screwing Nsereko out of the True Grit Championship and the subsequent social media campaign against the TV star. 

Rather than answering for his crimes, JC chose to run down Cash and give himself a Saturday night ego boost.

Nsereko interrupted preceedings and just as he was about to pop JC’s ego (and nose, hopefully), the boss’s lap dogs – Cash Money Sash, Brad Matthews and Franco Fate – came down to lay a beating on the crowd favourite, crushing his arm with a steel chair. 

When things had calmed down, with Nsereko taken to the back, any fan that was undecided on their opinion of JC were swayed as he took his place in the church pulpit, flanked by his new security team. Old school dickheadery still works in 2024. 

The narcissistic owner’s fingerprints were all over the next bit of action as True Grit champion Brady Phillips put the belt on the line against Joey Slade. 

Slade, an 18 year old, had been given this match by JC as a joke and Phillips treat being involved in the match like such to start, slating Joey for being a child and not understanding what you have to do to become a champion.

Phillips cited the sacrifices he’d made to get to this point in his career, promising to make an example out of Slade. 

Slade fired back to a great reception, telling Phillips about not having a real childhood because he wanted to be a professional wrestler, not having friends until he got in front of the True Grit crowd and how he wasn’t about to let his friends down.

This match did a fantastic job of showcasing both participants and setting things in motion for the future.

Brady Phillips big bro’d Joey in the opening exchanges and when Slade showed signs of actually threatening his reign, he cranked up the ferocity before resorting to dirty tactics thanks to his pal Riley Nova to put away the teenager. Nova went on to attack Slade post-match and I for one can’t wait to see Joey kick his arse. 

Brady Phillips looks like a champion. He acts like a champion. Book him and his big, lovely coat more often, BritWres. 

While the odds were always in Brady’s favour and despite JC’s harsh words from the pulpit, Slade proved he belonged in True Grit. One day, Joey Slade will be True Grit Champion and it’s going to blow the bloody doors off the Left Bank. 

With one young wrestler leaving with more light on them than they entered with, Zizi followed in Slade’s footsteps as she took on Ivy in a Loser Leaves True Grit showdown, the culmination of a bitter rivalry between former friends. The lights were dimmed, there was a pre-match video package and pyro. This felt big time and these two did not disappoint. 

There is nothing that takes the wind out of my sails more than when you have two wrestlers engaged in a hate-filled, heated conflict with threats to end careers or worse, that finally get their hands on each other and do a lock-up. It is stupid. Zizi and Ivy are not stupid. Ivy had taken Zizi’s hair in a previous attack, they weren’t about to trade wristlocks. 

They tore straight into each other, hammering each other around Left Bank, leading to a double count-out. True Grit are not stupid either, as the match restarted with NO DQ rules giving both competitors extra room to exact revenge on the other. 

They battered each other with chairs, bats and every limb, before Brady Phillps stormed down to aid his partner Ivy with a pair of handcuffs and scissors.

Despite yet more despicable actions from Ivy and her man, Zizi rallied, even refusing the opportunity to give Ivy a short back and laughed at, with the scissors, instead opting to drop her tormentor head first onto a chair. 

Zizi got the win with a final deathblow lariat, ignoring Ivy’s pleas for forgiveness, putting an end to her time in True Grit. 

I would put money on Zizi having big time matches like this all over the UK scene over the next couple of years. She’s ace. 

Judging by Ivy’s social media, this is the end of her time in True Grit specifically not wrestling as a whole, so promoters should make the most of the upcoming gaps in her schedule because there aren’t many that can do the job of “Queen Bitch” as well as her. 

After the interval, “Queen of the Ring” Priscilla defended the TGW Pride Championship against Adam Bolt. 

Going back to the identity conversation, this is a major part of it. Some companies say that everyone is welcome. Some say that they’re all inclusive and progressive. True Grit Wrestling just *is*.

I say this understandably from a limited viewpoint as a straight man but it must be fantastic for people to see wrestlers like Priscilla and Adam Bolt to potentially identify with. 

Priscilla received some of the biggest cheers of the night on the way to the ring but Bolt and his personal security guard Jackie T took the mickey, snatching Priscilla’s wig and mimicking the outlandish aspects of her character. 

While I’ve got a limited viewpoint of other people’s personal experiences, I’d like to think I have half a grasp on wrestling and I learned two things in this match; Priscilla can command a crowd and Adam Bolt is a talented dickhead. 

Though Jackie T was ejected for his ringside shenanigans, Bolt benefited from a blindside attack from HT Drake to steal the Pride Championship. 

Before the main event ladder match, Lou Nixon faced Ian Skinner in the Pure Grit League. There isn’t much to say about this match. Not because it was bad or underwhelming. Lou Nixon just knocked Ian Skinner out in about 45 seconds to win. That’s it. That’s the match. It was class. 

Lou Nixon is a big fella with a background in martial arts who has competed on BloodSport. Ian Skinner has not. Of course Lou Nixon wins by almost instant knockout. 

Finally, the True Grit Tag Team Championships were up for grabs in a four way Jacob’s Ladder match between champions Misery Business, Crashboat, Meat Wagon and Nashboat. 

This was madness. As you can probably tell by now, we don’t do move-by-move recitals around here, but even if we did, it would be impossible here.

Bodies were flung everywhere, tables were broken, ladders were bounced off people’s heads and leapt off. This is the part where you go over to True Grit’s Patreon and watch this show.

https://www.patreon.com/TrueGritWrestling

You can even get a free 7 day trial!

That’s what everyone involved in this match deserves. They don’t deserve me rattling through everything like we’re on Gillette Soccer Saturday. They deserve your time, your eyeballs, your appreciation on social media. Just go and do it.

You’re back? Mint, wasn’t it? Told you. 

Everything in this match felt geared up to the duo of Nashboat (Ace Matthews and Wing Commander Nash) capping off the final Leeds show of the year with a feelgood victory.

From fan support pushing them into the limelight, petitioning for inclusion in the match to using their peculiar and specialist brand of “in-ring psychology” to create chaos, it really felt like it was going to be Nashboat’s night. 

Yet here we are again, full circle, back at identity. Not every story has a happy ending. We don’t always get to win. Sometimes the girl picks the quarterback in the movie, not the nerd. Sometimes cheaters prosper. 

Sometimes when you’re fingertips away from achieving your dreams, you come crashing down to reality. Other times, Tom McManus, manager of Meat Wagon, pushes you off a ladder. That’s life, unfortunately and Meat Wagon are now True Grit Tag Team Champions as Nashboat laid in a heartbroken heap. 

That doesn’t mean the story is over, either. That’s why the fans will be back next time.

I can’t wait to see how Ace Matthews and Wing Commander Nash recover from this, with Meat Wagon gloating all over social media about the win.

Can Joey Slade get revenge on Riley Nova and how will Priscilla respond to HT Drake? After toppling Ivy, what’s next for Zizi and why, JC, why? 

True Grit Wrestling is everything that the Yorkshire wrestling scene has wanted to be for years. Gripping stories, top action and great production in front of a loyal, fierce community. 

A community I’d consider myself some part of now because True Grit Wrestling made a fan out of me. 

Photo Credits: True Grit Wrestling