Why the WWE UK Tournament Was Superior to the Cruiserweight Classic

Last weekend, the WWE held a special two day tournament in Blackpool, England to crown its first ever United Kingdom Championship. The WWE’s goal with the UK Championship Tournament was simple: to strengthen their foothold in the British wrestling market and to provide content that caters to the “hardcore” wrestling fans that make up an increasing part of the WWE’s revenue stream.

Luckily, Triple H and other organizers of the events already had a successful model for the UK Championship Tournament: last summer’s Cruiserweight Classic. Similar to the Cruiserweight Classic, the WWE filled the UK Championship Tournament with lesser known indie wrestlers, giving over a dozen experienced athletes a chance to shine in a WWE ring for the very first time. The WWE also plans to produce a weekly TV show featuring their new British division, similar to the cruiserweight-focused 205 Live.

The UK Championship Tournament did depart from the original Cruiserweight Classic model in several ways, though. The UK Championship Tournament only had 16 wrestlers, allowing the entire tournament to take place during a single weekend instead of spaced out over several months of tapings. While the Cruiserweight Classic had bigger stars than the UK Championship Tournament, using only 16 wrestlers meant there weren’t many “dud” wrestlers, holding the tournament back with boring or bad matches. And instead of holding the tournament at Full Sail University (home of WWE’s NXT tapings), the WWE used the distinctive Empress Ballroom in front of a hot crowd of British fans, making the event truly feel like a unique spectacle unlike anything else the WWE has ever put on.

More importantly, the WWE realized the value of using these tournaments to tell a good story, adding additional intrigue to the matches. The Cruiserweight Classic largely relied on athletic matchups and insane aerials to keep fans tuning in week after week. While it was fun to see Kota Ibushi do his thing, the Cruiserweight Classic felt detached at times due to a lack of tournament storylines. Fans were invested in some of the individual matchups, but only Brian Kendrick (who saw the tournament as his last shot at glory) really gave fans a reason to want to see him succeed.

Once the Cruiserweight Classic got to its “Final Four”, the only storyline left in the tournament was if Ibushi or Zack Sabre Jr. (the tournament’s two biggest stars) had signed a longterm WWE contract. When both Ibushi and Sabre lost their respective semifinal matches, signaling that neither were moving on to the WWE’s new cruiserweight division, even that “storyline” had run out before the finals.

The UK Championship Tournament, however, told several great stories over the course of the weekend. The largest storyline were the antics of the villainous “bruiserweight” Pete Dunne, who threatened the integrity of the tournament by attacking several of his opponents before matches. While Dunne is a popular wrestler among indie fans, Dunne quickly turned the crowd against him by feuding with tournament organizer William Regal and injuring two of the tournament’s other participants outside of the ring. Dunne cheated his way to the finals, but in a way that made him look like a threat instead of the WWE’s typical cowardly heel.

Dunne’s attacks also set up the finals quite nicely. Dunne targeted the shoulder of his finals opponent Tyler Bate, giving him a storyline injury and establishing Bate as the scrappy underdog. Dunne hoped to hurt Bate’s shoulder enough to prevent Bate from using his finishing move, a sitout underhook powerbomb that had finished off Bate’s last three opponents. Bate couldn’t get his shoulder to cooperate throughout the match and had to “pop” it back into its socket before finally pulling off the move to win the match and the UK Tournament. By building up Dunne throughout the tournament, it made Bate’s victory and championship that much more impressive in the end.

There were several other great storylines throughout the tournament. Finn Balor’s former student Jordan Devlin earned some major heat with a controversial and bloody first round victory over Danny Burch. Joseph Conners continually showed off his mutilated ear, giving both of his opponents a target to focus their attacks. We even got a dream match when Neville fought recent NXT signee and indie star Tommy End in an exhibition match.

Even though it didn’t have near as much starpower, the UK Championship Tournament surpassed the Cruiserweight Classic in several key areas and should go down as the more watchable tournament in the months to come. The WWE should look to the UK Championship tournament as a model for running all their tournaments in the future.