Some notes on the Lucha show earlier this afternoon.

The Roundhouse Theatre was fairly packed, looked to be perhaps more than for the NOAH show in Coventry a couple of weeks ago.

Lots of kids in the audience (this was an afternoon show) and their parents who seemed to have come along just to bring their kids but all the ones I saw clearly had a fucking great time too.

First thing worth mentioning was the ring announcer - think that guy from Electric Six with a tux and these SUPERB, shiny, pointy gold shoes. He was fucking awesome and promised the "the most exciting thing you have ever seen in your entire life." He was so unbelievably entertaining.

1. Mascarita Sagrada & Octagoncito vs. Pentagoncito Black & Bracito Da PlataThe minis were over HUGE. Bracito just slapped the FUCK out of the technicos. Tremendous crowd reactions and at times I felt like the grin would have to be surgically removed from my face. One of the most purely fan matches I've ever seen live. At one point I saw a man literally wipe tears of laughter from his eyes. Rudos won when Pentagoncito pinned Sagrada but had his feet on the ropes. They did some confusing back and forth challenging for a rematch (all in Spanish) but then they just left.

2. Magno vs. Black Fish OK match. I think Magno won. He has some lovely, graceful flying moves but looked pretty ropy on some of his other spots. Not much to it.

3. Negro Navarro & El Hijo Del Solitario vs. Solar & Cassandro Navarro appeared to be 110 years old but was great fun to watch. They did the arm-pump-over-the-shoulder spot the heels always used to do in Michinoku Pro and it got over great. Cassandro was wildly popular and fucking hilarious. His flouncingly gay version of Undertaker's rope walk spot was a riot. He appeared to land right on his head doing a dive very late in the match. Navarro and Cassandro really stood out and the others were fine, though Solitario did WAY too much kid-friendly interaction for a rudo. I forget who won. Does it matter?

4. El Hijo Del Santo, Incognito & Huracan Ramirez vs. Silver King, El Hijo Del Cien Caras & Blue Demon Jr. Incognito was over as a face for speaking good English and some nice flying moves. Santo did pretty much all his big spots but is showing his age. He got some chants but it was very obvious hardly anyone knew who he was. Crowd seemed to keep getting the rudos/technicos mixed up and only Silver King (who at one point hid behind the ring card girl) managed to really stay consistent as a GREAT heel. Caras sucked, Ramirez landed on his face at one point, nobody in the match could do legdrops. It was lots of fun but the crowd just wasn't as into it as I expected. Rudos won after kicking Santo in the nuts and Demon pinned him after some kind of move. By this point we'd been in the building over 3 hours and seen 4 matches and had to rush off to brave the tube and get home.

Despite some annoyances, this was well worth the money and the almost 9 hours of travelling. Lucha FUCKING rules. {plug}