The first barbed wire match in the history of Polish professional wrestling took place on February 15th, 2020 in Warsaw, Poland as part of the PpW show “Brawl For The Puppies.” The event was titled so as the purpose of the show was to raise funds for a local animal shelter. To me, it’s quite the juxtaposition that such a violent style of match would take place at an event supporting such a positive and heartwarming cause. But that’s professional wrestling and that’s why we love it.

Just a little bit about PpW before going forward and taking a look at the match. PpW calls itself a “backyard wrestling” promotion. In this instance, I think this traces back to the fact that some of the wrestlers may not have received formal professional wrestling training, are self trained and many got their start as a wrestler by wrestling in the backyard. However, PpW is currently running shows out of buildings and drawing crowds and HOT crowds at that. As someone that’s putting together a world map of professional wrestling, I’ve been asked my stance on listing backyard wrestling promotions on the map and whether or not they belong there.

For the most part, backyard promotions based in major wrestling countries with enormous wrestling scenes probably won’t make it onto the map. But internationally, my stance on that is different. A lot of the promotions that are considered “backyard” that I’ve encountered outside of major wrestling countries come about as a result of there not being wrestling training available. These promotions still acquire or build a ring, train themselves and put on shows that draw crowds. These promotions embody the spirit of pro wrestling in their country and although they aren’t formally trained, they deserve a spot on the map. PpW falls into that category to me.

Now that we’ve gotten some business out of the way, let’s take a closer look at the match. Viking, who’s announced as hailing from Prague, will go one on one with the hometown star Johnny Blade. Things start out pretty fast as Viking gets dropkicked into the barbed wire by Johnny Blade. The crowd, who is super hot throughout this entire main event, starts an early “Holy Shit!” chant.

Viking and Blade quickly end up brawling outside of the ring and through the crowd. Viking tries to kick Johnny Blade through a table but ends up going all the way outside and into the real world, the non wrestling world, and they brawl outside for a minute or two.

Once they make their way back to the ring, Viking starts pulling some treats out of his goodie bag. Apparently, he raided the kitchen and drills Johnny Blade over the head with a cheese grater before bending it over his face.

Somehow these two end up making their way back into the ring through all of the barbed wire and continue this vicious onslaught on each other. Viking grabs a light tube and smashes it over Johnny Blade’s back and glass flies everywhere, it even strikes the camera!

Not much later, Johnny Blade decides to return the favor and absolutely obliterates a bloody Viking across the back with a light tube of his own.

The 90+ fans in attendance (I’ve been told it was both 93 and 91 fans so 90+ feels safe) are totally into the match the entire time, going back and forth chanting each competitor’s name and loving every minute of it. Johnny Blade decides to scale to the top rope, and does so with the help of a milk crate since there is only one rope due to the barbed wire stipulation. Blade takes flight from the top turnbuckle with some type of light fixture that has fluorescent light tubes inside and lands a splash on Viking. Johnny Blade takes it all in after landing the splash and looks around like he’s having the time of his life.

Viking is eventually able to put Johnny Blade away with a choke slam/spine buster hybrid type of move on top of a small junk yard’s worth of debris including glass and thumb tacks.

Overall, this was a really fun match. Very spot heavy and very violent. Excellent work from two competitors who very clearly love professional wrestling and enjoy putting their bodies and livelihoods on the line to put on a great show. This won’t be a match that true grappling purists will be into but I think once “barbed wire” is in the title of the match stipulation, that will usually be the case.

As for PpW itself, when I asked one of their wrestlers what their promotion’s name stood for, they said that it was many things, so that’s why they prefer to just be known as PpW. I am very excited to see what PpW has in store next. With the type of energetic crowd they are pulling in and the risks they are willing to go through to put on a show that will thrill that audience, I think we’ll continue to see some exciting and violent firsts coming from PpW in Poland.

You can watch the entire Brawl For The Puppies for free right here:

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