Wembley Stadium is one (well, two) of the most historic venues in Britain. Built originally in 1923, it originally held 125,000 fans making it one of the largest stadiums in history.
This was eventually lowered to 82,000 seats in 1990 due to the ban on safe standing. While primarily used to host football matches like England games and the FA Cup Final, the stadium branched out to things like concerts and, most pertinently, wrestling matches.
While it was closed and knocked down in 2000, the Wembley Stadium was rebuilt into the glorious construction that we see today. They regularly cram in over 90,000 rabid fans whenever the Three Lions play and have even hosted the biggest wrestling event of all time there (which we’ll get to later, do not worry!).
While the idea of a Wembley Stadium has stood for over a century and through two different stadia, there has been a shockingly brief amount of wrestling events taking place there.
While WWE are hoping to host WrestleMania in Wembley Stadium in the near future, they have only managed one singular event in the nation’s stadium in their storied history.
Other companies have managed even more.
Summerslam 1992 Was The First Wrestling Show At Wembley Stadium
In 1992, WWE’s business was not looking good. Fans in the US weren’t buying the new slimmed-down superstars following the almost catastrophic steroid trial.
Stars like Hulk Hogan (who lied about wrestling at Wembley Stadium and wrote a song about it) being taken off TV to deflate their steroid-infused bodies and the product suffered as wrestlers like Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart were pushed as the new faces of the company.
American fans weren’t buying it. The Brits loved it. Smaller wrestlers had always done well here, with the lighter, more agile stars like Mick McManus, Jackie Pallo and Johnny Saint became huge stars in the Golden Era of British Wrestling.
Bret Hart had become a huge name all over Europe. His popularity matches England’s own Davey Boy Smith, whose moniker of The British Bulldog did nothing to dissuade his countrymen from cheering him on every chance they got.
Due to this immense wave of popularity for the WWE following the end of British wrestling on TV in 1988, Vince McMahon decided to bring Summerslam 1992 to Blighty, with Wembley Stadium the only suitable venue for the occasion.
The event was massive. It filled the airwaves, as TV, radio and newspapers couldn’t get enough of the wrestling being back in the big time – even if it was that horrible American stuff, not real wrestling like we were used to.
All the big stars, sans Hulk Hogan, turned up for the show. Huge names like The Undertaker, The Road Warriors, Randy Savage and the Ultimate Warrior all wrestled in front of the alleged 80,000 strong crowd (it was more like 72,000 in actuality).
However, none of these men were the main event because Bret Hart defended his Intercontinental Championship against Davey Boy Smith in what Vince McMahon called the greatest wrestling match he’d ever seen.
It was filled with action and drama and is what Bret Hart considers his magnum opus. It was even more impressive considering that the British Bulldog was completely off his head and had no idea what he was doing!
Bret Hart carried him to a 30-minute classic all on his own. While the Bulldog pinned Hart to become the WWE Intercontinental Champion, the words “Bret, I’m Fooked!” are what is most remembered from this event.
Despite the ridiculous success of Summerslam 1992, WWE would never return to Wembley Stadium. They wouldn’t even run a stadium show against for another 30 years, and that was in Cardiff at the Millenium Stadium.
It would be 31 years until another wrestling company took the plunge and wrote their name into the history of wrestling at Wembley Stadium.
Here is the full card for Summerslam 1992 at Wembley Stadium:
- The Legion Of Doom (Animal & Hawk) (w/Paul Ellering) vs. Money Inc. (Irwin R. Schyster & Ted DiBiase) (w/Jimmy Hart)
- Virgil vs. Nailz
- Shawn Michaels (w/Sensational Sherri) vs. Rick Martel
- WWE Tag Team Championships: The Natural Disasters (Earthquake & Typhoon) (c) vs. The Beverly Brothers (Beau Beverly & Blake Beverly) (w/The Genius)
- Crush vs. Repo Man
- WWE Championship: Randy Savage (c) vs. The Ultimate Warrior
- Kamala (w/Harvey Wippleman & Kim Chee) vs. The Undertaker (w/Paul Bearer)
- WWE Intercontinental Championship: Bret Hart (c) vs. The British Bulldog
The New Wembley Stadium Hosts AEW’s Debut In The UK For All In 2023
All Elite Wrestling had only been running shows for three years when they took the huge gamble to run their first-ever UK show at Wembley Stadium.
Of course, this wasn’t the same venue as the one that held Summerslam 1992. That had been torn down in 2000, the archaic yet iconic structure making way for a shiny new state-of-the-art footballing facility in the heard of London.
It was a fantastic stadium, the envy of the world. This new Wembley Stadium would go on to host Championship League Fina, European Championships, FA Cup ties, England matches and even Olympic Gold Medal events. It was, and is, a magnificent stadium.
But a four-year-old wrestling company filling it out for their first-ever show In Britain? Fulham Director of Football Tony Khan launched the promotion in 2019 as an alternative to the WWE and had found great success in the UK, but nothing on the level that the WWE had in 1992.
When he, alongside wrestling legend Nigel McGuinness, announced AEW All In 2023 would be broadcast from Wembley Stadium, many thought he had misspoken. Surely he meant Wembley Arena?
Nope.
On August 25th 2023, a well-built, star-studded card attracted over 80,000 fans (81,035) from all over Britain and Europe for this incredible event that celebrated the almighty rise of AEW.
They didn’t skimp on the guest stars for the British fans either. Grado and Will Ospreay were drafted in for appearances, the latter for a high-profile dream match against Chris Jericho.
Other stars on the card included CM Punk (in his last match for AEW before a backstage fight saw him finally fired), Sting, Kenny Omega, MJF, Adam Cole, Christian Cage, Jay White, Jon Moxley, Orange Cassidy and many, many more. It was a who’s-who of top-class wrestlers and legends and none of them disappointed.
The show was a fantastic one up and down the card, with no lulls in the action all the way through. Highlights included Sting’s last match in the UK, Chris Jericho joining the crowd in singing Judas to the ring and seeing MJF and Adam Cole hug to send the fans home at the end of wonderful night of wrestling at Wembley Stadium.
Here is the full card for AEW All In 2023 at Wembley Stadium:
- AEW World Championship: Adam Cole vs. MJF (c)
- AEW World Tag Team Championship: FTR (c) vs. The Young Bucks
- AEW World Women’s Championship: Hikaru Shida (c) vs. Britt Baker vs. Saraya vs. Toni Storm
- AEW World Trios Championship: The Acclaimed and Daddy Ass vs. The House of Black (c)
- REAL World’s Championship: CM Punk (c) vs. Samoa Joe
- Stadium Stampede: Orange Cassidy, Best Friends, Eddie Kingston, Penta El Zero Miedo and a mystery partner vs. Jon Moxley, Claudio Castagnoli, Wheeler Yuta, Santana, Ortiz and a mystery partner
- Coffin match: Sting and Darby Allin vs. Swerve Strickland and Christian Cage
- Trios match: Kenny Omega, “Hangman” Adam Page and Kota Ibushi vs. Jay White, Juice Robinson and Konosuke Takeshita
AEW All In 2024 Returned To Wembley Stadium With An All-Time Great Wrestling Match
A year after AEW ran their debut show in the UK, they returned to Britain for another crack at Wembley Stadium.
The week before the August bank holiday they had taped Dynamite and Collision in Cardiff, Wales. Michael Oku made his AEW debut that night, while Mark Andrews and Flash Morgan Webster were backstage and almost made it out to the ring.
That show was a big success but it was at Wembley Stadium on the Sunday that fans were waiting for. While there was a large drop in attendance, nearly 50,000 fans bought tickets to see the potential end of Bryan Danielson’s career at AEW All In 2024.
The American Dragon, who cut his teeth wrestling in Butlins in England to start his career, is a fan favourite worldwide and especially in Britian. He put his career on the line against AEW Champion Swerve Strickland, either walking out of Wembley Stadium with the belt or walking back home with his career behind him.
The pair went on last and the crowd was electric. From the moment the first notes of The Final Countdown blasted through the speakers, the crowd simply willed Danielson to victory in what challenged Bret Hart vs Davey Boy Smith as the best wrestling match ever at Wembley Stadium.
While his winning was a fantastic feel-good moment, as he celebrated with his children in the ring, the best part of the show was during the Casino Gauntlet match. After over a decade away from the ring, AEW commentator and English legend Nigel McGuinness entered the match and returned to the ring.
The pop was deafening. Nobody could tell that he walked out to an Oasis track due to the ridiculous amount of shocked screams from the crowd. Over surprise appearances included Ricochet, Zack Sabre Jr and (the recently retired) Sting in a show that arguably surpassed last year’s edition of the show.
However, arguably the most anticipated match on the show was the AEW Women’s Championship bout. Toni Storm, at her peak in her “Timeless” character, defended her title against her fellow Brit (yes, Toni Storm IS British) Mariah May, in a storyline that was almost a year in the making.
AEW announced that AEW All In 2025 will not be coming to the UK, instead going to Texas for the first time. They are returning to Wembley Stadium in 2026, following Forbidden Door in London this year as well.
The full Here is the full card for AEW All In 2024 at Wembley Stadium:
- The Final Countdown: Title vs. Career” for the AEW World Championship: Swerve Strickland (c) vs. Bryan Danielson
- AEW Women’s World Championship: “Timeless” Toni Storm (c) vs. Mariah May
- TBS Championship: Britt Baker vs. Mercedes Moné
- AEW American Championship: Will Ospreay vs. MJF (c)
- Coffin Match for the TNT Championship: Darby Allin vs. Jack Perry (c)
- FTW Championship: Hook vs. Chris Jericho (c)
- AEW World Tag Team Championship: FTR vs. The Acclaimed vs. The Young Bucks (c)
- London Ladder Match for the AEW World Trios Championship: The Bang Bang Gang (Juice Robinson and The Gunns) vs. The House of Black (Malakai Black, Brody King, and Buddy Matthews) vs. A Mystery Team vs. The Patriarchy (Christian Cage, Nick Wayne, and Killswitch)
- Casino Gauntlet Match for a Guaranteed World Title Shot
- All In Zero Hour: Willow Nightingale and Tomohiro Ishii vs. Kris Statlander and Stokely Hathaway
Where the future of wrestling at Wembley Stadium goes next, nobody knows. Sadiq Khan seems intent on bringing WrestleMania to the capital, which would be the first time the show has been held outside the US or Canada.
