In this series, journalist and spoken word artist Cormac Fitzgerald travels to a different town or suburb each week to write about the gigs and cultural experiences you rarely see covered by Irish media outlets. 

This week’s subject: Over The Top Wrestling in a GAA Club in Finglas.

*****

HARRY MCGRATH, A sneering poet “from Trinity College Dublin!”, emerged unannounced from behind the curtain in the hall of Erin’s Isle GAA Club in south Finglas, north Dublin, to the ominous entrance music of The Dance of the Knights from the Romeo and Juliet Russian ballet.

Dressed in leather trousers and a long fur coat, McGrath taunted the crowd as he approached the ring in the middle of the hall, interrupting the announcer. A group of young boys tried to high five him, but he laughed contemptuously in their faces before stepping into the ring.

“Let me make something absolutely clear to you,” McGrath said through the mic to the 100 or so people in attendance.

“Trinity has more intelligence than anywhere else in Ireland, and no one of a good educational standard has ever come from Finglas!”

The crowd booed and hissed and shouted, and McGrath continued to taunt them, eventually summoning a young steward into the ring to take his coat.

The steward dropped the coat, and McGrath lashed out and was about to slam him to the ground when a half-naked muscly man wearing boots and a pair of trunks ran out from backstage and chased the Trinity poet from the ring, hyping up the crowd as he did so.

The man was Renzo Rose, the current OTT Champion, and we were in the wild world of Over The Top Wrestling!

Harry McGrath goading the crowd.

Smack down those Sunday blues

I had arrived in Erin’s Isle about an hour earlier, parking up on a residential street around the corner from the club, a friendly man letting me partially block his driveway, well used to it.

The roads all around were wedged with cars, with many people there to watch the Junior Hurling Championship Final being played on the main pitch.

It was a dreary Sunday afternoon, but the place was full of people: there were kids running around, the sidelines were full, the club bar was hopping, and in general there was enough of a buzz around to contend with the end-of-the-weekend blues.

And to top it all off, the hall at the back of the club had been transformed into a makeshift arena, with lights, music, chairs, and in the centre of it all – the ring.

People – mostly families with young boys, but all ages were represented – sat around three sides of the ring, and the merch stand with the OTT branding and faces of the wrestlers was at the other. Before long, the announcer emerged and the show kicked off.

The first match was a calm enough affair to get the crowd going, a bout between CBL and Bitter Sweet Josh. But it set the template for everything else to come:

One person is the “heel”, the bad guy/gal, who riles the crowd up and angers them, and the other is the “face”, the good guy/gal, who the crowd roots for.

They meet in the ring, with a referee present, and go at it, trading slaps and blows, grappling, swinging each other against the ropes, jumping from the corner turnbuckles, picking each other up and slamming each other into the mat with a variety of moves, in and effort to inflict enough damage to pin each other for three-count.

All the while, the wrestlers are interacting with the crowd, either goading them or encouraging them to shout and cheer. It’s remarkably effective; a tried and trusted method of the strange physical theatre of what is known as “professional wrestling”.

Instantly the crowd is on the side of the face, and baying for blood, and it’s easy to forget that you’re not in some high-stakes gladiatorial arena where good is pitched against evil, but a GAA hall on a dark, drizzly Sunday afternoon.

Irish wrestling showcase

Professional wrestling is a strange beast – a mixture of sport, athleticism, physical theatre and just plain acting. The best-known brand is the ubiquitous WWE in the US, the pinnacle that every wrestler strives towards.

But beneath that level, in countries across the world, there are smaller brands and promotions where those passionate about wrestling work long hours to hone their craft and possibly go for a shot at the big time.

OTT is one such brand. Founded in 2014 by Joe Cabray and Leonard Hanna, the pair had the goal of showcasing the best of Irish wrestling and set up a school that would train Irish wrestlers and possibly act as a feeder into the WWE.

Since then, it has been going strong, with a mixture of big marquee national and international events in places like the National Stadium, and smaller touring shows like the one in Erin’s Isle.

Some big names in WWE, like former World Heavyweight Champion Gunther, and former World Tag Team Champion JD McDonagh (real name Jordan Devlin), have passed through OTT on their way to the top.

While wrestlers might have some small hope of making it on the international stage, for most taking part it will always remain just something they love, and not something they will be able to make a full living from.

“It’s definitely a bit of a labour of love these days,” Joe Cabray, present on the day manning the AV desk, told me.

It’s tough, there’s just so much competition going on. We don’t get any funding or anything like that so it can be a little bit tight to keep it running. There’s an awful lot of overheads as well, but everyone’s really passionate about it. 

The agony and the ecstasy

That passion was on full display on the Sunday I saw the show. There were six matches in total across a packed two hours of action. It was mostly male wrestlers, but one woman, Kat Von Kay, fought and defeated the over-confident Big Bad Dirty Nicky.

Across the evening, there were flips and slams, pile drivers and suplexes, hurricanranas (one wrestler flipping another by the neck with their legs), high-flying manoeuvres, close calls, and drama, drama, drama.

The sneeringly posh Harry McGrath versus Renzo Rose in a title fight was the main event and gave the show a through-line narrative arc that really brought the theatre into the evening.

I was amazed at how quickly I and the rest of the crowd got into it, rooting for good over bad, genuinely annoyed when one of the heels sprayed water at the audience, or goaded the crowd, or (damn them!) won the fight, happy to suspend our disbelief and get lost in the theatrics of it all. As far as I know, the winner is worked out before, and the matches are a mix of improv emerging out of well-rehearsed set pieces. But don’t let that spoil the fun!

The majority of the fans were young, pre-teen boys and girls, old enough to soak up the choreographed violence and the spectacle of it all, but young and innocent enough to fully believe everything they were seeing.

(a former obsessive WWF fan myself, I am speaking from experience here: if you had told me it wasn’t fully real at the age of 11, I just wouldn’t have believed you)

But there were a fair few older faces in the crowd, too. OTT fans who follow the show around. One of the real draws that separates it from the WWE is the closeness to, and interaction with, the wrestlers.

“I like the bigger international wrestling shows, there’s a lot of polish and that, but at an OTT show you’re right up seeing the wrestlers in person,” said Adam Murphy (27) from Drimnagh.

It gives a different, more intimate atmosphere. 

That it does. The heels get right up in the face of the crowd, trading barbs with them and stopping to get into arguments mid-bout.

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At one point I thought there might be an incident when one of the wrestlers – Matthew Bullett Smith – snatched a boy’s hat and flung it into the crowd.

The boy and his friends went wild when Smith was eventually pinned by the high-flying Kingslayer Jay after a brilliant match of big moves and many twists and turns, which saw Jay retain his European title.

The Finglas crowd loved it, jumping up and down whenever a big move was executed, or a wrestler just about avoided being pinned for a three-count.

Harry McGrath going for the kill.

By the end of the last fight, Harry McGrath had Renzo Rose on the ropes. The referee had been stunned temporarily (a regular occurrence) and McGrath was about to hit a knockout blow with the title belt. 

But suddenly, the young steward from the First Act slid into the ring and snatched the belt from McGrath. The crowd smelled blood, and gathered impromptu around the edge of the ring, banging their hands on the mat. 

The steward hit a shocked McGrath with the belt, giving Renzo the chance to execute his signature move and down the haughty poet (nothing worse) to be pinned. The ref roused himself just in time to hammer out the three count, the bells rung, Renzo Rose retained his title and the crowd went wild!

The event had all the ingredients of great theatre: stakes, conflict, heroes and villains and even a David Vs Goliath redemption arc thrown in for good measure. 

The crowd gathers round for the final pin of the night in Erin's Isle GAA Club.

Beyond the mat

Once the show was over, the wrestlers re-emerged from the back to sign autographs and take photos with the crowd. In between posing and signing, I asked Kingslayer Jay – real name Danny Cross – about how he was feeling after the show.

“I’m feeling great. I love Finglas, love doing these shows, especially these tour shows,” he said.

You get to the heart of what wrestling is. Everyone remembers what we were like as kids and we wanted to be in the front row of a WWE show and I feel like we bring that energy to Finglas and places like that

Cross is from Ballyfermot. A software developer during the week, he gives up most of his weekends to being a professional wrestler. He has been doing it for 10 years, and still loves it more than ever.

The Kingslayer

“It’s a hard life you have to balance, but it’s what you love as well, and it’s a labour of love

Even though we’re making money out of this, we’re not making a lot to live on. But you could pay me nothing I’d still do this, you know?

Does he dream of joining the WWE one day?

“Everybody’s ambition is to make this your full-time living. Everybody’s sending stuff to WWE to see can we get picked up or trying to build you brand,” he said.

But it’s hard and if you do that for your whole life you’re just going to start chasing a car that will never stop for you so you need to enjoy the journey, you need to love shows like this, and you need to keep going no matter what happens. 

With the fighting done, pictures taken, autographs signed, the crew start to pack everything away, transforming the wrestling arena back into a humdrum GAA hall.

It is getting darker and wetter outside, Monday morning beckons as the wrestlers, sworn enemies less than 20 minutes ago, now laugh and work together to dismantle the ring, united by the love of the game.