Xia Brookside has revealed that her dad, Robbie Brookside, has never been a part of her wrestling career.
The English star was just 19 years old when she competed in the Mae Young Classic for the WWE. She wrestled in the second tournament in 2018, which was famous for Tegan Nox’s heartbreaking injury in her match against Rhea Ripley.
The tournament was huge for Xia Brookside. Even though she lost her opening match to IYO SKY in just three minutes, knocking her out of the tournament, it was the first she had done anything in wrestling alongside her father – British wrestling legend and NXT trainer Robbie Brookside.
Robbie Brookside had nothing to do with her training. He didn’t want her to become a wrestler and certainly didn’t want anybody to think she got where she was through her association with him.
This worked out great as Xia Brookside became a star in Japan before signing with the WWE, eventually being a part of NXT UK until it closed in 2022.
Xia Brookside spoke about her father in a recent interview with Fightful. The English wrestler revealed that Robbie Brookside didn’t want her to be a wrestler, due to the obvious drawbacks of a life on the road.
She even said that the pair don’t ever talk wrestling together, which seems odd for a family where wrestling has been their livelihoods for decades.
“He’s never been a part of my career. A lot of people don’t know that I’ve never trained with him. Even to this day, I’ve never trained with him. Before I started wrestling, and even now, we still don’t talk wrestling. We kept our journeys very separate.” Xia Brookside said about Robbie Brookside.
“He didn’t want me to be a wrestler, for all of the obvious reasons. And I knew I was going to get the, ‘She’s only here because of her dad.’ A lot of people get that—all second-generation wrestlers do.”
“I at least wanted to be able to look at him and look at myself in the mirror and say that wasn’t true. So we kept it completely separate.”
“When they asked him about the Mae Young Classic, they were like, ‘Do you mind if we bring her in?’ And he said, ‘Well, if you think she’s good enough.’“
“And I was like, ‘Oh my God—trust your own father to be the one to say, ‘No, she’s doing it on her own.‘”
