Progress Chapter 78: 24 Hour Progress People review - A stacked card with something for everyone

24 Hour Progress People poster
24 Hour Progress People poster

After hearing so much of the buzz around the UK’s hottest promotion, it’s safe to assume I felt a palpable sense of excitement for my first Progress event. With a nuclear and one of the most stacked cards I have seen, Chapter 78 certainly lived up to the hype.

Kicking off the show was Eddie Dennis defeating a debuting ‘Speedball’ Mike Bailey. This was a stellar start to the show, with the high-flying nature of Bailey being a brilliant contrast to the nastiness of Dennis.

This was followed by Isla Dawn defeating Lana Austin and Jordan Devlin defeating Chris Ridgeway in two very high-quality matches that would’ve been show-stealers on any other card. Demonstrating the hard-hitting modern British style and causing many of the trade-mark, “This is Progress!” chants from the rabid crowd.

The first half of the show was closed out by a stellar bout between David Starr and Ilja Draganov. This match was something special. Well and truly pushing each other to the limits, they had the split crowd in the palm of their hand through the course of this hard-hitting bout. As the match reached what the crowd thought was its climax, the shocking return of former champion Travis Banks shocked the crowd and managed to achieve one of the most vitriolic heel turns due to his interruption of the clash.

The second half of the show kicked off with the tag-team match of Aussie Open vs Calamari Thatch Kings. Aussie Open retained in this slow-build clash that featured hard-hitting and high-flying action that has become expected of the stellar teams and Progress as a promotion.

The Atlas open challenge followed suit with a shock contender of Zack Gibson. This boiled down to a promo-fest with some hilarious jibes at each other and their positioning in various companies (Zack Gibson’s WWE runoff limits?).

After Seven jibing one time too many the "match” got underway if one could call it a match. This due to the five second run time of the match, with Trent Seven pinning Gibson to retain his title. This received a pop only comparable to the return of Banks, the crowd chanting “5, 5, 5” at Gibson as he entered the back.

The main event of the show was every bit the slobber-knocker we expected it to be - the intimidating force of Walter clashing with the technical high-flying of Mark Haskins. This match was a hard-hitting affair, with the larger Walter swatting Haskins in a classic David vs Goliath bout.

Although coming close, and making the crowd buy into each near fall, Walter came out victorious to retain his Progress World Title. After one last word from owner/promoter Jim Smallman, the event was over.

Progress – Chapter 78 lived up to the seemingly impossible heights that the card set. Featuring many clashes of styles, there truly was something for every wrestling fan at this show. It certainly fulfilled my expectations of a first show for the red-hot promotion. And at only £19 a ticket it is seemingly one of the best value events around.

Edited by Raunak J