Sheamus explained how he and British stars Drew McIntyre and Wade Barrett were signed by the WWE in the 2000s.
The trio joined the WWE in the mid-2000s when there was not a lot of British names in the company. Before the signing of Paul Burchill, the only British stars were William Regal, Dave Taylor and Finlay.
All of them came through the World of Sport TV show, working for Joint Promotions in the 1980s. Regal was even Big Daddy’s tag team partner early in his career!
Did you know that William Regal almost started his own wrestling promotion in 1992?
Because of the way they came through, Sheamus has little advice to follow on how to make it to the WWE. Times had changed and for a young man in Ireland, opportunities seemed. However, he made it to WWE and eventually became a multi-time WWE Champion and future WWE Hall of Famer.
Sheamus recently spoke with Chris Van Vliet where he recalled how he, Wade Barrett and Drew McIntyre made it through the UK and Irish scene to make it in the WWE.
They were inspired by Paul Burchill, who was the first of the new British wrestling scene to get a WWE deal. The trip became friends, eventually getting a deal with the WWE.
“So, Fit Finlay was the only one, and Fit went into World of Sport, so he was over in the UK mostly anyway. For me, it was kind of uncharted territory. I met Fergal – Finn Balor – just before he went to New Japan, so he went to Japan before he came over. But for me, there really wasn’t a clear path.”
“That’s where I always wanted to go. They had a couple of live events, but the only person who really had gone over there was Regal. But again, Regal and Dave Taylor, they’d all come in from World of Sport, and they’d all cut their teeth in Germany. And Andrio went to WCW, Fit went into WCW, so for me, it was different.“
“The only one I think who kind of stood out was Paul Burchill. He was the first kind of one that we all looked at, like… he went over and, while he was a big guy in England, he could do all these crazy high-flying moves. So, we were kind of looking at him, and then there was Katie Burchill—or whatever her real name was. I think it was Katie Lee.”
“So, yeah, that was basically it. Then me, Drew, and Wade—Drew and I were wrestling Irish, going back and forth to Scotland for British Championship Wrestling. I met Wade at Celtic Pro Wrestling at a show in Wales, and then we saw the size of him. I talked to the promoter of Irish Whip Wrestling, and we had him over. “
“So, me, Wade, and Drew kind of became friends overall. Then we did a couple of live events and dark matches, and we went for some tryouts before some of the shows.”
If you use any quotes from this article, please give a H/T to BritWrestling for the transcription
