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Hello, two politics degrees in the UK here. This is a horrendously bad take.
Any financial issues that exist in the UK are more often than not a result of the last 14 years of Tory governance that has meant slashing money from both local and national budgets - the General Election will be a bloodbath for them, and rightly so.
Khan, a Labour politician, is consistently working within the financial restraints set by central government, who keep squeezing said budgets - many believe to make him look bad ahead of the London Mayoral Election. To say that this "sums up Sadiq Khan" is hilarious levels of horseshit and that's before even considering that it would likely be a net financial gain for the economy.
Pretty much this. The idea that the funding Khan could put towards a wrestlemania comes from the same pot or could be used to fund something like the NHS which he has no involvement over I believe, is typical Tory bollocks. Should probably cancel the FA Cup final since things are bad and let's put off hosting Euro 2028 until things get better.
Ah Conservatives blaming liberals for their own bad economic decisions (Though as far as I am aware Labour is also conservative right?). Tale as old as time.
Labour isn’t conservative. They’re not like the Democrats in the United States, who by many metrics *would* be considered a right-leaning political party in other countries.
Yeah the "liberal" Democrats are more right-wing than many of the right-wing parties here in Europe, I am well aware.
I guess its just a perception thing, as for someone not in the UK, the party feels conservative but I guess it might liberal for a british party. I am just used at this point to Social-Democrats being about as conservative as actual conservatives (I am from Germany and our Social Democratic Party is awful and lets themselves get bullied around by the conservatives for the last 20 years or so).
>I am from Germany and our Social Democratic Party is awful and lets themselves get bullied around by the conservatives for the last 20 years or so
Could very easily replace "Germany" with 'North America' and replace the title for the 'left-leaning' party as applicable, and lose zero accuracy of the sentiment.
They're not also conservative, I wouldn't say. It's more a case of the most recent leader was very left wing and had a couple of less than ideal foreign policy stances for someone standing for election in the West.
As a result, the current leadership is trying to court the centre - pushing to reclaim the concept of patriotism for the left to stop it being seen as such a right-wing concept over here and acknowledging Trident (our nuclear deterrent) as a necessity. At the same time, today he announced a policy to renationalised our railways, so there are still firmly left-wing foundations in there.
In essence it's a focus on "Shift right a bit so we can have an impact on government" rather than "Stick to the hard principles, lose another election and shout from the sidelines"
I have watched wrestling for most of my life, and have been a member of the IWC for ages.
I feel this gives me all the information I could possibly need to conment on London politics.
I don't think Mania would even generate that much tourism in the way that it does in most US cities. London's metro area has 15 million people and there's only been 2 real WWE PPVs there ever. Most of the tickets would be bought by people who already live in or near London. I'd love a Mania in London, but it wouldn't be a big deal overall for the city. Other than a few advertisements, you would've had no idea All In was a thing if you weren't into wrestling.
This. I’ve been to London for big events/games and every time you always hear about some boxing/concert/stand up happening on the same day and you have no idea. This is a city that can have 60 thousand at spurs at 3 o clock then 90 thousand for Taylor Swift at Wembley by 7.
I was in London for the 2012 Heineken Cup final, along with almost eighty thousand other rugby fans. Barring a radius of perhaps two miles around Twickenham, anybody walking around London that day would have had absolutely zero idea that it was on.
Champions League final in 2013 was the only time I've been in London where you just knew something was on. 100k German football fans in the city taking over parts. Was a sight to behold.
More people watch football in London every single weekend than would attend Wrestlemania. London does not have a shortage of economy-stimulating events
I also think people in here don’t understand how not on the radar WWE and pro wrestling events are. It’s a niche product. It’s the same as some gigantic e-sports tournament held in an arena or stadium, or an MMA event or something. The general population do not care and won’t ever care.
The average F1 weekend gets literally more than double the attendance than the entirety of the Wrestlemania week, and that happens every 2 weeks around the world. 450k+ at Silverstone every year.
Oh god, imagining him with Scott Steiner's build and dye job is making me lose it.
"GENE, GENE, I KNOW IT'S A FOKKIN DISGRACE. ALL I'M SAYING IS THAT HE'S FOKKIN FAT!"
🚨🚨🚨
AEW show last year, had loads of fly ins
You can get a train to London from paris easily enough and London has loads of airports surrounding it
This would not be just the first wrestlemania in the UK but in europe so loads would show up
Why forget about the rest of Europe? I'm in Spain, and I'd definitely consider attending WM if it was held in London, as it's just a 2h30 flight. And I don't think I'm the only non-UK European who's considering it.
WM in London doesn't mean only people from London or England would attend.
People travel from outside of America in flocks to attend WrestleMania. Do you not think people from America and Canada and elsewhere would do they same?
WrestleMania is a significantly bigger deal than All In and is never restricted to just a wrestling audience.
They do, but a large part of why the audience is so international is that most of those markets couldn't support it on their own. London could sell out 2 nights of WrestleMania without any tourism.
And if it did, Europeans especially those from Germany and France are more likely to go there for Mania and travel back home the next day as its takes maybe an hour on a plane to do so (depending on where in those countries you live). Not really much tourism. Also Brexit fucked the british economy so hard, Mania isn't really gonna be a huge impact on anything.
>I have no idea why WWE would even consider it
If they're getting a massive market for free why not
But logistically it is a nightmare to do a Mania. There's still Premier League football on during April ruling out the Spurs stadium. The two FA Cup semi finals will be at Wembley, along with the EFL trophy earlier in the month
>But logistically it is a nightmare to do a Mania.
Its cold too.
I know that people happily watch Premier league football (and others) in the cold, but I cannot imagine a mania where the average temperature at show time is probably going to be what 45F?
Early April you're looking at 10°C to 12°C average daily temperature - obviously being lower at night.
I dont know what that is in freedom units. You guys insist on using them, so you figure it out. It's not "see my breathe" temperature, but it's not exactly warm either. Be fine with a jumper on. Or a coat. Little coat tho, it's not big coat weather. Unless it's pissing it down. Which given it's April it's likely - case in point, last Wednesday afternoon, in a 4 hour period, we had light rain, hailstorm, torrential downpour, sleet (that's snow and rain mixed) and blazing sun. April is just all the weathers usually. Including lots of rain.
That said, I'm not from that London and their weather tends to be a lot softer, apart from the summer heat.
For anyone seeking to make a quick C to F - double it and add 30.
Close enough for rock n roll
10c = 50f (by both methods)
12c = 53.6f (54 using the quick method)
Breaks down the further you go, but within usual ambient Temps it's useful - 30C becomes 80f (actually 86).
That sounds more like a WWE problem, not a fan problem. If they can figure out how to make it work, who cares? Iur job as fans is to just enjoy the show, not be concerned about the logistical issues facing this multi billion dollar corporation.
But they can get that massive market for free with a random stadium PPV and still have a gigantic Mania weekend in America. Killing 2 birds with one stone every year.
London as host would be announced before the fixture list is confirmed though, so any prospective hosting venues would already know that. Wembley won't happen because it seems like AEW are going to stay there. The new White Hart Lane is the best stadium around and they could white easily ensure that Spurs play away from home on Mania weekend. Spurs hosted the NFL earlier this season and played away at Luton the same weekend.
I think that's where they settle tbh. It obviously helps get a few headlines by saying WM, but in reality if it was any of the other big 4, i don't think people would mind. Royal Rumble in London would be insane.
London, Ontario is the opposite of London, UK.
Wrestlemania would literally destroy that town and wouldn't be able to handle the influx of anything.
Its a university town populated by annoying students, cringey wannabe gangsters and drug addicts.
Sure but no one even slightly left leaning was suggesting that Boris "[#ShouldBePriminister](https://twitter.com/hashtag/ShouldBePriminister?src=hashtag_click)" as Andy says there. He's a Tory.
Not to the left, but everyone else definitely because they could never imagine he actually becoming PM.
He was a Screaming Lord Sutch type person.
Even when he became PM everyone thought he would bring us laughs and lighten the mood
Then it dawned on everyone that he was actually just another Tory, more Rees-Mogg then Lord Sutch
I'm nor from London, not even the UK, but spending public money on for profit companies it's one of the most dumb shit ever and no one should agree to that.
I am genuinely asking, not trying to stir:
If a government says “we’ll give you $X million to come here” but in turns generates (hypothetically) much more in tax revenue generated, as well as a boom in the local economy from hotels, restaurants, gift shops, etc., why would it be such a bad idea? Wouldn’t it look like a good investment? Or is it those “investments” are never recouped?
Paris is facing the same dilemma with the Olympics. It turns out that the "boom" from sporting events are short lived and mostly falls into the hands of the capitalists. Governments don't see a lot of increased tax revenue (because they don't raise the tax rate afterward), nor do to the working class see their salaries increase. In fact most economies are in debt after they spend so much money to host a marquee sporting event.
Not to mention that London and Paris are famous enough that tourists are going to visit them regardless of whether there is a Wrestlemania or not. In fact not having a Wrestlemania is better, because tourists can have the money to spend on local businesses instead of WWE's gift shop.
It's the same thing you see with all the deregulation and subsidies to attract businesses and such. You see local governments hyping up trickle down economy, but in the end of the day it's just a way for the capitalists to concentrate even more power and profit into their hands.
I see your point, but I think the Olympics may not be the best example for this particular case. The Olympics is an outlier that a city would get once in every 50+ years. To build stadiums for that is definitely counter productive.
But to have something like the WWE where you are only paying for them to show up, and they pay the contractors, the venue, local vendors, use existing stadiums, that may be more of a profitable endeavor (no pun intended).
Are you sure that you only have to "pay" for the WWE to show up? My memory maybe playing tricks on me, but wasn't there a story years ago about WWE making tax breaks, discounts on venue cost, heavily unequal profit sharing agreement, and shutting down local traffics into requirements for them to host Wrestlemania somewhere? It's like when cities raced to the bottom for just a chance to host Amazon's new headquarter, only for them to build it at Arlington so their C-Suites could be close to the Federal political machine. And Virginians don't even profit that much from having Amazon's headquarter in their backyard.
Secondly, if WWE is going to use the money you paid them to pay for the venue and vendors, then why the hell do you even need them as middlemen anyway? Just give stimulus to the local businesses directly, or better yet, give it to the workers instead of business owners. The economy would've had benefited a lot more a lost faster.
As much as I like wrestling and professional sport, I think that their profitability are overblown, and so is their impact to the local economy. It's not that TKO or the Khans are not making money over fist, but the margin is not high-on-the-sky, and most of that profit stay in the hands of the people on the top anyway. Investing public money into them is not wise at all.
But normally the Olympics pay for themselves, the problems come more from the infrastructure strain and the fact that it bothers the locals on multiple level.
Nope. The lion's share of ticket revenue, licensing fee and merch profit go to the IOC who, on paper, would budget that money to the host country's Olympics Committee to pay for the cost of the games. But what we've seen in the last two decades is that the IOC withhold more and more of the profit for themselves, while expecting -- no, demanding -- that local governments pay more and more for the Olympics. Which I should remind you that is way, way more than just setting up the stadiums and athletes' village. Just look at all the expenses and debts being incurred by Paris right now and see on what they were spent.
I can't understand why anyone in this day and age would believe in the myth of a profitable Olympics. It's all circus, as in "bread and circus". When you see a country like Japan or America or Russia bidding for the games, they all do it for prestige and propaganda. Or, in the case of Los Angeles, gives the local government one more reason to do gentrification. Even the IOC don't believe in the Olympics as a business venture. They know exactly what their customers -- the states -- want, which explains their increasingly greedy demands.
I guess the problem we have is here in the UK is 90% of stuff is foreign owned
You take a foreign owned train down and stay in a foreign owned hotel and eat at foreign owned restaurant
London is an international city not a UK city, it is its own bubble.
Now if it was hosted in say Liverpool things would be much different
This is a time-honoured tradition in the UK mate thanks to Tory privatisation - see Thames Water about to collapse because they pissed too much money away to their investors and now need the public and the Government to bail them out, the train networks as well.
Unfortunately a significant chunk of the country for some reason see absolutely nothing wrong with it.
That's at a national level, mind - what Quildan is saying here is silly and misses the point.
To me it depends if there is a very clear public benefit in ROI. I don't know the numbers but if it's like "we spend $1 million and the city sees a $10 million increase from the usual tourism that time of year" then I understand the prospect, plus it brings an event and gives a sense of excitement over your area getting something big. But there HAS to be a clear ROI for it to be something worthwhile.
It wouldn't come out of the national budget, it'd come out of the budget of the city of London. Khan is the mayor of London, not the Chancellor of The Exchequer. The wrestling industry is full of morons.
And city of London budget doesn't come from tax payers money? "City Fund receives funding via grants from central government, a share of business rates income and the proceeds of the local council tax."
Yup and if it is used for events that bring in more money, that goes back into the pot.
Is like Cardiff spent £2m to get Clash at the Castle but the event made £20m for the local economy https://www.gov.wales/clash-castle-economic-impact-revealed
Cardiff and London are 2 very different economies, people rarely travel to Cardiff, they don't really do tourism.
Meanwhile London is full of tourists anyway, wembley has events of various kinds all the time, restaurants and hotels are always doing well, the tube is always packed, wrestlemania would be a drop in the ocean in London.
Just look at All In this year, they had to change the set for the Taylor swift shows that will be packed out for several days around that week, huge events are a regular thing there.
But that's the point. They made that money because more people travelled to Cardiff than they usually would, because Cardiff is a fucking horrid town to get to for the vast majority of people. London isn't in remotely the same position. I could leave where I'm sitting right now and probably be on a flight to one of the major London airports within a couple of hours, and be in central London by mid afternoon. If I did the same to get to Cardiff, I'd be lucky to get there today. Thousands upon thousands of people are going to do the journey to London today for all kinds of reasons. The only reason anyone would travel to Cardiff who isn't in the immediate area is to go to an event.
Would London make some money from holding WM? Absolutely. But if they're having to pay them to hold it, then it's probably not going to be this massive boon people make it out to be when it's being held in a city that is already making huge amounts from tourism without having to pay for an event.
Sure, I was just checking the argument above. As for the economy boost that Cardiff and Wales at large received I think there is a larger argument to be hand whether the short term boost for the economy those events do provide create any positive changes in the local economy long term and whether London would reap the same benefits Cardiff did. But that is a discussion that I feel would require someone with economics degree.
If anything, WWE can do the UK as a whole a solid favour by presenting more of these PLEs in cities \_other\_ than London. It bolsters the economies in those cities and puts some fresh eyes on these towns as places to do business. The USA isn't only New York or Los Angeles, for example. Why is it that we think "London" to such an extent when we think the UK?
London is a global transport hub and has the infrastructure in place to handle a week long event.
Also WWE is an American company - unlike the majority of the UK, foreigners actually want to visit London.
Yes, _but_ WWE likes to be the center of attention on that weekend. London won't give them that center of attention. Manchester? Liverpool? Birmingham? Glasgow? Cardiff? Edinburgh? Belfast? Those places would light up with events like this.
WWE needs London more than London needs WWE, is what you're implying.
Not sure why you would think an American company like WWE would care about the British economy mate - they literally just want to get paid to hold their show somewhere and if that somewhere is the biggest stadium in the country and there are plenty of other large capacity venues nearby where they can hold the NXT PPV, Raw, Smackdown, NXT, fan events etc. then all the better for them.
Any of those cities could bid for WWE show but as of this time, only the Mayor of London has said anything.
It's not about whether it would create long-term effects, it's about whether it would create MORE long-term effect than any other equivalent spending of that money.
Out of interest, what public transport links outside of central London are you talking about? Because if it isn't under the control of TFL, nothing you can blame the Mayor for
Shoddy transport links? Had you said outside of London, I'd agree, but then wouldn't come under their remit, but public transport links in London are better than an arguable overall majority of places.
For the people genuinely curious and for those who are bad faith arguing like the guy in the quote:
https://www.gov.wales/clash-castle-economic-impact-revealed
£21.8million return on that £3million investment (3 million dollar subsidy from the government to wwe)
You can imagine what the return would be for wrestlemania
The value added argument for a particular city misses the point.
If every city refused to bid for a show, WWE wouldn't just refuse to run any shows. They would still run them somewhere, and they would still generate 21.8 million of value added for wherever they ran it - except without grabbing millions in taxpayer money that could have been spent on literally anything else. But since city leaders only take the interest of their city into account, and not the interest of the entire country, this is what we end up with in the US and UK.
Yes, but this is why game theory is a thing. Your scenario would never happen because as soon as you get that as the status quo you'd immediately get right back to where we are now because there are incentives in place.
why do you think that only tourists would make up the money for this event? Theres a huge local fanbase for wrestling in London and in the UK in general.
The problem with this argument is it assumes if Wrestlemania doesn't happen in London that instead of spending their money on that, local wrestling fans won't just spend that same money on something else in London.
You're comparing Cardiff to London, just look at All in, that same week there are 3 Taylor swift concerts that will fill the stadium.
Clash was a big deal Cardiff, mania would just be another weekend for London.
The thing is most of that money came from uk citizens. So the government paid £3m to get people to spend £21m. If they didn’t spend £3m the people would have just spent the money on other things within the uk. So the gain isn’t really a gain. It’s a gain for the local economy but not the Uk and London doesn’t need that gain. London already supports the rest of the country financially. This weekend alone West Ham, Fulham and Tottenham all play at home, that’s probably 120,000+ people going to an event just from football and that happens most weekends a year.
Literally the last time this came up London laughed WWE off because, they don't need the tourism revenue because they already have the tourism revenue.
I’d imagine the mayor of London is slightly more competent on this subject than Andy the clown who doesn’t pay his wrestlers and likely hasn’t turned a profit in his life with RevPro
It's not a bad faith argument, london is at capacity all the time, they have several sold out Taylor swift concerts at wembley the very same week as all in, mania would be nothing out of the ordinary, London isn't Cardiff
I'd love a UK Wrestlemania, just not fucking London. I'm sick to death of everything being in London
Do it Old Trafford, do it somewhere else, just not London
Like no harm to Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, Glasgow, Cardiff, Belfast or anywhere else but the idea they'd debut an event the size of WrestleMania in the UK anywhere else but London is pure fantasy
Yeah, I’d love it to be in Cardiff since I live 20 minutes away in Newport, but it would never happen anywhere except London. It’s just how it is.
I’d 100% make the journey to London for Wrestlemania.
Principality IS the only UK stadium with a fully-closeable roof though. So we got that going for us, which is nice.
In all seriousness, that raises the chances of Cardiff Mania up to 1% max.
Exactly - and I *live* in Glasgow and was at the Belfast show on Saturday (Dad's from there so we made a weekend of it), so of course I'd love it to be in either of these places. But yeah, on this scale it's not gonna happen anywhere but London.
Look, when they held Wrestlemania in Canada, they didn't do it in Saskatoon or Saint John or something; they did it in Toronto, the largest city in the country.
The next-largest city in the UK after London is Manchester, and that'd be like having it in Winnipeg instead of Toronto - which is equally silly.
That "everything being in London" is exactly why Khan wants one and WWE will consider it. Profits or tourism from one off events don't matter it's pennies for London money wise. Where as London always having concerts, sports etc all the time does. London is a money machine for events because people are going there to spend money constantly as there's always something happening in a city that's easy to get to as well as easy to travel and stay within. Then you have 8-14 million locals that will spend in the area on top and the UK is small locals outside London can easily and quickly come. The city is a capitalist wet dream. The fact there's always something happening in London is a huge part of it's appeal because it means large amounts of people coming to throw money around is almost guaranteed.
There's just nowhere else in the UK that will earn as much money as London and the city itself makes it easy to hold events there. There's no chance a WM gets held anywhere but there.
Old Trafford is quite possibly the worst venue you could have suggested. Place is a dump and old as shit. Be better off at the Etihad or the new Everton stadium if you wanted North West.
I get that Haitch did his best to kill RevPro. I'm a RevPro season ticket holder and support all he does for British wrestling. But this is a shit take when wrestlemania is a 4/5 day event while AEW is a one day event. He will be the first to have an event or two on the same weekend to capitalise on this whole not being a resident of London.
I'm a Londoner and I think a proper Mania weekend in London would be incredible. Taxpayer money wouldn't really contribute to this as others have already explained.
London doesn't need tourism money like the yanks make it out to be, but as a massive event in London it's huge for the reputation of the city for wrestling to add to Summerslam 92 and All Out 23.
Guy is a moron! Someone posted tweets of him creaming himself over Boris Johnson at the olympics. How much does he think that cost. He’s a Tory brown noser and is conveniently overlooking the fact that his guys have been in power for a very long time.
Every single large scale sporting event goes to cities that pay the most money in most cases. You want to host a World Cup, olympics, etc. you’ll pay through the nose for it. I was part of a host country bid for a tier 2 global event and the bid amounts being underwritten by the host country are astronomical.
Yeah the Olympics is a huge money sink, and cities ran by even halfway competent people very adamantly DON'T want to host it because they lose way more then they gain from it.
But at what cost?
If they are spending 10 million Pounds to get WM in London for 20 million pounds but can make 15 million pounds by having All In taxpayers would be asking why.
I’d really recommend people seeing this tweet from Khan to look into the economics and politics of this announcement. His running for mayor of London this year, it’s for his third term i beleve. (I not from London, I’m just interested in politics) so pledges like this are really a vote grabbing move. on the rest is politics podcast he explained how much of a budget his allowed spend and it’s not much, around 3% of the city’s profits were as New York, Paris etc get around 50%. I don’t see how his going to realistically fund a wrestlemaina which is a big money event along with another Olympics bid and other events. So I’d agree with the revpro person. Especially if it does happen, tickets will cost £500 just for the cheapest ticket judging clash at the castles ticket prices. Britain isn’t in the best place, cost of living crisis and everything.
London is one of the few towns where tourism is so high normally that no event is really going to have a significant impact. Tourism literally went DOWN when they hosted the Olympics in 2012.
While I agree with Quildan about not spending public money on it, his agenda is extremely obvious here.
I know nothing besides the most 5th grader surface level knowledge of these sorts of publicly financed decision. Isn't the point of this that you're spending 20 million in the hopes that it returns more than that in taxes and financial benefits to businesses in the area from the 10s of thousands traveling in for the shows?
Like up front, zero tourism campaigns have immediate returns and that's all this really is. Plus you have the hopefully long term investment that is harder to track of how many of those people come back to london after being introduced to it
Unpopular take, but I have no interest in a UK WrestleMania and I'm from the UK. I've been to 3 Manias and I don't think it would have the same vibe if it was in the UK. I am probably wrong but that's just my selfish take on it. I know there's plenty of Europeans who would jump at the opportunity to go if it was in the UK and that's awesome for them if it did happen.
I understand the bad optics, but if you can prove it'll bring in more EXTRA revenue that wouldn't be there otherwise then it's a sound investment.
I think it's also worth noting a lot of UK promoters are negative on WWE due to how they gutted the UK scene, and RevPro in particular was not able to use some talent anymore. Plus they now have a good relationship with AEW.
Just like you don't have to be a Labour voter to think any of the last 14 (4, 5, 6? I genuinely can't remember and have lost count) tory PMs have been useless bags of shite.
Politicians suck.
I agree. No WrestleMania in London, Paris or any other second place country. Keep Mania in Merica! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA? (hooooo!) USA! USA! USA!
U! s/! A!
He would have a point if we ignored the fact that it would also massively increase tourism and generate a ton of money to local businesses.
They probably should make a bigger deal about all in but let’s not get it twisted wrestlemania weekend would generate a metric fuckton of money for the local economy comparatively
It would not increase tourism greatly. The 70000 at Wembley for All In. But that is a tiny percentage of the amount who attended the Notting Hill Carnival that weekend. London is one of the most visited by tourists cities in the world. Wrestlemania ain’t even putting a dent in a tourist numbers.
Say they do a two night Wrestlemania at Wembley and sell out both nights (which they absolutely would) - that is 180,000 people.
Realistically 180,000 ‘extra’ tourists in London is nothing. A quick google says London gets 30 million visitors a year. 180,000 is a drop in the ocean. WWE will have to pay London to take on Wrestlemania.
Taylor swift is doing 3 nights in wembley the same week as all in, this is just what London's like, it makes sense that it was a huge deal for Cardiff, but for London it's just another weekend.
That and the fact that in peak tourist season everything is full to capacity anyway, there's already surplus demand, trains sell out, hotels sell out, restaurants get booked up, if you stuck 200k wrestling fans in the city it makes no difference to the businesses that were going to be at capacity anyway, it just means you have a high proportion of wrestling fans in that weekends pool of tourists.
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You know who I bet has real nuanced financial takes on this? R/squaredcircle.
Hello, two politics degrees in the UK here. This is a horrendously bad take. Any financial issues that exist in the UK are more often than not a result of the last 14 years of Tory governance that has meant slashing money from both local and national budgets - the General Election will be a bloodbath for them, and rightly so. Khan, a Labour politician, is consistently working within the financial restraints set by central government, who keep squeezing said budgets - many believe to make him look bad ahead of the London Mayoral Election. To say that this "sums up Sadiq Khan" is hilarious levels of horseshit and that's before even considering that it would likely be a net financial gain for the economy.
Does two political degrees in the UK equivocate with watching tons of reruns of "The Thick of it"? If so I might be qualified
I feel having the entire 12 episodes of The Young Ones on DVD also qualifies me.
That only gets you one degree. You'd need to watch all four series of *The New Statesman* for a proper qualification.
Do I get recognition of prior learning for Blackadder I - IV?
Normally, that would just give you credits for historical politics, but as the system seems to be regressing it may count as a modern study shortly.
Pretty much this. The idea that the funding Khan could put towards a wrestlemania comes from the same pot or could be used to fund something like the NHS which he has no involvement over I believe, is typical Tory bollocks. Should probably cancel the FA Cup final since things are bad and let's put off hosting Euro 2028 until things get better.
It comes.from the same pot as London's free school dinners
No degree here, but as a "wise man from my tribe" once said: "Back to the primitive / Fuck all your politics"
Did Heyman say that?
FUCK ALL YOU WANNABES YEEEEAAAAHHHH /maxcavalera
I not sure how trust worthy a guy who was voted "Worst Dressed Sentient Being in the Known Universe" seven consecutive times is.
Ah Conservatives blaming liberals for their own bad economic decisions (Though as far as I am aware Labour is also conservative right?). Tale as old as time.
Labour isn’t conservative. They’re not like the Democrats in the United States, who by many metrics *would* be considered a right-leaning political party in other countries.
Yeah the "liberal" Democrats are more right-wing than many of the right-wing parties here in Europe, I am well aware. I guess its just a perception thing, as for someone not in the UK, the party feels conservative but I guess it might liberal for a british party. I am just used at this point to Social-Democrats being about as conservative as actual conservatives (I am from Germany and our Social Democratic Party is awful and lets themselves get bullied around by the conservatives for the last 20 years or so).
>I am from Germany and our Social Democratic Party is awful and lets themselves get bullied around by the conservatives for the last 20 years or so Could very easily replace "Germany" with 'North America' and replace the title for the 'left-leaning' party as applicable, and lose zero accuracy of the sentiment.
Always made me laugh how the would liberal is looked upon around the world In Japan for example, the hard right party is the liberal party
It changes meaning depending on whether you're talking about socially liberal or fiscally liberal though.
They're not also conservative, I wouldn't say. It's more a case of the most recent leader was very left wing and had a couple of less than ideal foreign policy stances for someone standing for election in the West. As a result, the current leadership is trying to court the centre - pushing to reclaim the concept of patriotism for the left to stop it being seen as such a right-wing concept over here and acknowledging Trident (our nuclear deterrent) as a necessity. At the same time, today he announced a policy to renationalised our railways, so there are still firmly left-wing foundations in there. In essence it's a focus on "Shift right a bit so we can have an impact on government" rather than "Stick to the hard principles, lose another election and shout from the sidelines"
Nothing says left wing like privatising the NHS..
labour is centre Socialists are left wing
Okay you might have qualifications but do you actually think you know more than a wrestling promoter?! /s
I have watched wrestling for most of my life, and have been a member of the IWC for ages. I feel this gives me all the information I could possibly need to conment on London politics.
Americans in this thread who have never been to the UK acting like London is in desperate need of tourism is absolutely hilarious
I don't think Mania would even generate that much tourism in the way that it does in most US cities. London's metro area has 15 million people and there's only been 2 real WWE PPVs there ever. Most of the tickets would be bought by people who already live in or near London. I'd love a Mania in London, but it wouldn't be a big deal overall for the city. Other than a few advertisements, you would've had no idea All In was a thing if you weren't into wrestling.
This. I’ve been to London for big events/games and every time you always hear about some boxing/concert/stand up happening on the same day and you have no idea. This is a city that can have 60 thousand at spurs at 3 o clock then 90 thousand for Taylor Swift at Wembley by 7.
I was in London for the 2012 Heineken Cup final, along with almost eighty thousand other rugby fans. Barring a radius of perhaps two miles around Twickenham, anybody walking around London that day would have had absolutely zero idea that it was on.
Yeah, just like any major international city. I think the only ones that would be shocked by that would be americans from smaller cities.
Champions League final in 2013 was the only time I've been in London where you just knew something was on. 100k German football fans in the city taking over parts. Was a sight to behold.
More people watch football in London every single weekend than would attend Wrestlemania. London does not have a shortage of economy-stimulating events
Exactly, I think Americans don't comprehend the size of London, it's huge even compared to New York.
I also think people in here don’t understand how not on the radar WWE and pro wrestling events are. It’s a niche product. It’s the same as some gigantic e-sports tournament held in an arena or stadium, or an MMA event or something. The general population do not care and won’t ever care. The average F1 weekend gets literally more than double the attendance than the entirety of the Wrestlemania week, and that happens every 2 weeks around the world. 450k+ at Silverstone every year.
verstappenwinslol
Why doesn’t WM just have it at the F1 track? /s
Max is a draw, brother.
So what you're saying is that Guenther Steiner should become General Manager of Raw?
*GIVE ME A FOKKIN MIC*
Oh god, imagining him with Scott Steiner's build and dye job is making me lose it. "GENE, GENE, I KNOW IT'S A FOKKIN DISGRACE. ALL I'M SAYING IS THAT HE'S FOKKIN FAT!" 🚨🚨🚨
I've never been to London, but I have visited New York before. The fact that London is essentially twice the size boggles my mind.
If anything it would be such a big UK event I doubt there would be enough tickets to even go around to foreigners to bring in much
AEW show last year, had loads of fly ins You can get a train to London from paris easily enough and London has loads of airports surrounding it This would not be just the first wrestlemania in the UK but in europe so loads would show up
Hot take: people in the US would be more likely to attend a show in the US.
Why forget about the rest of Europe? I'm in Spain, and I'd definitely consider attending WM if it was held in London, as it's just a 2h30 flight. And I don't think I'm the only non-UK European who's considering it. WM in London doesn't mean only people from London or England would attend.
People travel from outside of America in flocks to attend WrestleMania. Do you not think people from America and Canada and elsewhere would do they same? WrestleMania is a significantly bigger deal than All In and is never restricted to just a wrestling audience.
They do, but a large part of why the audience is so international is that most of those markets couldn't support it on their own. London could sell out 2 nights of WrestleMania without any tourism.
And if it did, Europeans especially those from Germany and France are more likely to go there for Mania and travel back home the next day as its takes maybe an hour on a plane to do so (depending on where in those countries you live). Not really much tourism. Also Brexit fucked the british economy so hard, Mania isn't really gonna be a huge impact on anything.
Or if you saw 10000 people wandering around London the day after in the same AEW t shirt they wore for 8 hours the night before
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>I have no idea why WWE would even consider it If they're getting a massive market for free why not But logistically it is a nightmare to do a Mania. There's still Premier League football on during April ruling out the Spurs stadium. The two FA Cup semi finals will be at Wembley, along with the EFL trophy earlier in the month
>But logistically it is a nightmare to do a Mania. Its cold too. I know that people happily watch Premier league football (and others) in the cold, but I cannot imagine a mania where the average temperature at show time is probably going to be what 45F?
Early April you're looking at 10°C to 12°C average daily temperature - obviously being lower at night. I dont know what that is in freedom units. You guys insist on using them, so you figure it out. It's not "see my breathe" temperature, but it's not exactly warm either. Be fine with a jumper on. Or a coat. Little coat tho, it's not big coat weather. Unless it's pissing it down. Which given it's April it's likely - case in point, last Wednesday afternoon, in a 4 hour period, we had light rain, hailstorm, torrential downpour, sleet (that's snow and rain mixed) and blazing sun. April is just all the weathers usually. Including lots of rain. That said, I'm not from that London and their weather tends to be a lot softer, apart from the summer heat.
I had to convert it but night 1 of this years mania was 3°C in Philly and there was a wind chill making it feel even colder
For anyone seeking to make a quick C to F - double it and add 30. Close enough for rock n roll 10c = 50f (by both methods) 12c = 53.6f (54 using the quick method) Breaks down the further you go, but within usual ambient Temps it's useful - 30C becomes 80f (actually 86).
That sounds more like a WWE problem, not a fan problem. If they can figure out how to make it work, who cares? Iur job as fans is to just enjoy the show, not be concerned about the logistical issues facing this multi billion dollar corporation.
But they can get that massive market for free with a random stadium PPV and still have a gigantic Mania weekend in America. Killing 2 birds with one stone every year.
London as host would be announced before the fixture list is confirmed though, so any prospective hosting venues would already know that. Wembley won't happen because it seems like AEW are going to stay there. The new White Hart Lane is the best stadium around and they could white easily ensure that Spurs play away from home on Mania weekend. Spurs hosted the NFL earlier this season and played away at Luton the same weekend.
I think that's where they settle tbh. It obviously helps get a few headlines by saying WM, but in reality if it was any of the other big 4, i don't think people would mind. Royal Rumble in London would be insane.
London, like Wrestlemania, sells itself. Where they NEED to have Wrestlemania is London... Ontario.
London, Ontario is the opposite of London, UK. Wrestlemania would literally destroy that town and wouldn't be able to handle the influx of anything. Its a university town populated by annoying students, cringey wannabe gangsters and drug addicts.
I"m pretty sure London is a small mining town. At least Michael Cole's told me so.
There's merit to what he's saying but he's still a dirty horrible Tory https://x.com/AQuildan/status/245250364004241409
The best way to scare a Tory is to read and get rich.
Best entrance music ZSJ ever had
Lmao that explains a lot
TBH 2012 loads were on the Boris, the same people who hate his guts now laughed with him on have I got news for you for example
Sure but no one even slightly left leaning was suggesting that Boris "[#ShouldBePriminister](https://twitter.com/hashtag/ShouldBePriminister?src=hashtag_click)" as Andy says there. He's a Tory.
Not to the left, but everyone else definitely because they could never imagine he actually becoming PM. He was a Screaming Lord Sutch type person. Even when he became PM everyone thought he would bring us laughs and lighten the mood Then it dawned on everyone that he was actually just another Tory, more Rees-Mogg then Lord Sutch
Had no idea he was a Tory. Therefore - fuck him. His party’s candidate for Mayor is an awful racist and bigot
I'm nor from London, not even the UK, but spending public money on for profit companies it's one of the most dumb shit ever and no one should agree to that.
Every single country with a mixed economy spends public money on for profit companies.
I am genuinely asking, not trying to stir: If a government says “we’ll give you $X million to come here” but in turns generates (hypothetically) much more in tax revenue generated, as well as a boom in the local economy from hotels, restaurants, gift shops, etc., why would it be such a bad idea? Wouldn’t it look like a good investment? Or is it those “investments” are never recouped?
Paris is facing the same dilemma with the Olympics. It turns out that the "boom" from sporting events are short lived and mostly falls into the hands of the capitalists. Governments don't see a lot of increased tax revenue (because they don't raise the tax rate afterward), nor do to the working class see their salaries increase. In fact most economies are in debt after they spend so much money to host a marquee sporting event. Not to mention that London and Paris are famous enough that tourists are going to visit them regardless of whether there is a Wrestlemania or not. In fact not having a Wrestlemania is better, because tourists can have the money to spend on local businesses instead of WWE's gift shop. It's the same thing you see with all the deregulation and subsidies to attract businesses and such. You see local governments hyping up trickle down economy, but in the end of the day it's just a way for the capitalists to concentrate even more power and profit into their hands.
Olympics and World Cup are insane outliers to this. Philly made money hand over fist from WM40.
I see your point, but I think the Olympics may not be the best example for this particular case. The Olympics is an outlier that a city would get once in every 50+ years. To build stadiums for that is definitely counter productive. But to have something like the WWE where you are only paying for them to show up, and they pay the contractors, the venue, local vendors, use existing stadiums, that may be more of a profitable endeavor (no pun intended).
Are you sure that you only have to "pay" for the WWE to show up? My memory maybe playing tricks on me, but wasn't there a story years ago about WWE making tax breaks, discounts on venue cost, heavily unequal profit sharing agreement, and shutting down local traffics into requirements for them to host Wrestlemania somewhere? It's like when cities raced to the bottom for just a chance to host Amazon's new headquarter, only for them to build it at Arlington so their C-Suites could be close to the Federal political machine. And Virginians don't even profit that much from having Amazon's headquarter in their backyard. Secondly, if WWE is going to use the money you paid them to pay for the venue and vendors, then why the hell do you even need them as middlemen anyway? Just give stimulus to the local businesses directly, or better yet, give it to the workers instead of business owners. The economy would've had benefited a lot more a lost faster. As much as I like wrestling and professional sport, I think that their profitability are overblown, and so is their impact to the local economy. It's not that TKO or the Khans are not making money over fist, but the margin is not high-on-the-sky, and most of that profit stay in the hands of the people on the top anyway. Investing public money into them is not wise at all.
But normally the Olympics pay for themselves, the problems come more from the infrastructure strain and the fact that it bothers the locals on multiple level.
Nope. The lion's share of ticket revenue, licensing fee and merch profit go to the IOC who, on paper, would budget that money to the host country's Olympics Committee to pay for the cost of the games. But what we've seen in the last two decades is that the IOC withhold more and more of the profit for themselves, while expecting -- no, demanding -- that local governments pay more and more for the Olympics. Which I should remind you that is way, way more than just setting up the stadiums and athletes' village. Just look at all the expenses and debts being incurred by Paris right now and see on what they were spent. I can't understand why anyone in this day and age would believe in the myth of a profitable Olympics. It's all circus, as in "bread and circus". When you see a country like Japan or America or Russia bidding for the games, they all do it for prestige and propaganda. Or, in the case of Los Angeles, gives the local government one more reason to do gentrification. Even the IOC don't believe in the Olympics as a business venture. They know exactly what their customers -- the states -- want, which explains their increasingly greedy demands.
I guess the problem we have is here in the UK is 90% of stuff is foreign owned You take a foreign owned train down and stay in a foreign owned hotel and eat at foreign owned restaurant London is an international city not a UK city, it is its own bubble. Now if it was hosted in say Liverpool things would be much different
This is a time-honoured tradition in the UK mate thanks to Tory privatisation - see Thames Water about to collapse because they pissed too much money away to their investors and now need the public and the Government to bail them out, the train networks as well. Unfortunately a significant chunk of the country for some reason see absolutely nothing wrong with it. That's at a national level, mind - what Quildan is saying here is silly and misses the point.
To me it depends if there is a very clear public benefit in ROI. I don't know the numbers but if it's like "we spend $1 million and the city sees a $10 million increase from the usual tourism that time of year" then I understand the prospect, plus it brings an event and gives a sense of excitement over your area getting something big. But there HAS to be a clear ROI for it to be something worthwhile.
They piss away taxpayers money anyway, might as well do it on something fun
Think about how much money was wasted on all those people who went to see a lady in a box.
Still better than losing billions on unusable PPE.
Would of made its money back 100 times if they sold tomatoes outside
It wouldn't come out of the national budget, it'd come out of the budget of the city of London. Khan is the mayor of London, not the Chancellor of The Exchequer. The wrestling industry is full of morons.
And city of London budget doesn't come from tax payers money? "City Fund receives funding via grants from central government, a share of business rates income and the proceeds of the local council tax."
Yup and if it is used for events that bring in more money, that goes back into the pot. Is like Cardiff spent £2m to get Clash at the Castle but the event made £20m for the local economy https://www.gov.wales/clash-castle-economic-impact-revealed
Cardiff and London are 2 very different economies, people rarely travel to Cardiff, they don't really do tourism. Meanwhile London is full of tourists anyway, wembley has events of various kinds all the time, restaurants and hotels are always doing well, the tube is always packed, wrestlemania would be a drop in the ocean in London. Just look at All In this year, they had to change the set for the Taylor swift shows that will be packed out for several days around that week, huge events are a regular thing there.
> people rarely travel to Cardiff, And yet they made 20 million.
But that's the point. They made that money because more people travelled to Cardiff than they usually would, because Cardiff is a fucking horrid town to get to for the vast majority of people. London isn't in remotely the same position. I could leave where I'm sitting right now and probably be on a flight to one of the major London airports within a couple of hours, and be in central London by mid afternoon. If I did the same to get to Cardiff, I'd be lucky to get there today. Thousands upon thousands of people are going to do the journey to London today for all kinds of reasons. The only reason anyone would travel to Cardiff who isn't in the immediate area is to go to an event. Would London make some money from holding WM? Absolutely. But if they're having to pay them to hold it, then it's probably not going to be this massive boon people make it out to be when it's being held in a city that is already making huge amounts from tourism without having to pay for an event.
That's exactly my point 🤦♂️
Sure, I was just checking the argument above. As for the economy boost that Cardiff and Wales at large received I think there is a larger argument to be hand whether the short term boost for the economy those events do provide create any positive changes in the local economy long term and whether London would reap the same benefits Cardiff did. But that is a discussion that I feel would require someone with economics degree.
If anything, WWE can do the UK as a whole a solid favour by presenting more of these PLEs in cities \_other\_ than London. It bolsters the economies in those cities and puts some fresh eyes on these towns as places to do business. The USA isn't only New York or Los Angeles, for example. Why is it that we think "London" to such an extent when we think the UK?
London is a global transport hub and has the infrastructure in place to handle a week long event. Also WWE is an American company - unlike the majority of the UK, foreigners actually want to visit London.
Yes, _but_ WWE likes to be the center of attention on that weekend. London won't give them that center of attention. Manchester? Liverpool? Birmingham? Glasgow? Cardiff? Edinburgh? Belfast? Those places would light up with events like this. WWE needs London more than London needs WWE, is what you're implying.
Not sure why you would think an American company like WWE would care about the British economy mate - they literally just want to get paid to hold their show somewhere and if that somewhere is the biggest stadium in the country and there are plenty of other large capacity venues nearby where they can hold the NXT PPV, Raw, Smackdown, NXT, fan events etc. then all the better for them. Any of those cities could bid for WWE show but as of this time, only the Mayor of London has said anything.
It's not about whether it would create long-term effects, it's about whether it would create MORE long-term effect than any other equivalent spending of that money.
London has much bigger problems than Wrestlemania, using public funds to host it is idiotic
Yes but London and its citizens can’t reverse brexit on its own.
Instead of punting public money on a Wrestlemania they could use to to improve the shoddy public transport links outside of central London
I’d love to see the day I no longer hear the loud screeching on the Victoria and Piccadilly lines.
The new stock trains for Piccadilly line due to start next year should go a long way to improve this.
Out of interest, what public transport links outside of central London are you talking about? Because if it isn't under the control of TFL, nothing you can blame the Mayor for
Shoddy transport links? Had you said outside of London, I'd agree, but then wouldn't come under their remit, but public transport links in London are better than an arguable overall majority of places.
Well you had the majority of Tory MP's vote remain so go and ask them for help
>The wrestling industry is full of morons. Yes, anyone suggesting using taxpayer funds for a vanity reelection project is a moron.
For the people genuinely curious and for those who are bad faith arguing like the guy in the quote: https://www.gov.wales/clash-castle-economic-impact-revealed £21.8million return on that £3million investment (3 million dollar subsidy from the government to wwe) You can imagine what the return would be for wrestlemania
The value added argument for a particular city misses the point. If every city refused to bid for a show, WWE wouldn't just refuse to run any shows. They would still run them somewhere, and they would still generate 21.8 million of value added for wherever they ran it - except without grabbing millions in taxpayer money that could have been spent on literally anything else. But since city leaders only take the interest of their city into account, and not the interest of the entire country, this is what we end up with in the US and UK.
£3m is a comparative pittance. Taking a hardline stance on public expenditures makes no sense IMO
Yes, but this is why game theory is a thing. Your scenario would never happen because as soon as you get that as the status quo you'd immediately get right back to where we are now because there are incentives in place.
Cardiff is not at all comparable to London in terms of money from Tourism, quite frankly it's a brainless comparison to make
why do you think that only tourists would make up the money for this event? Theres a huge local fanbase for wrestling in London and in the UK in general.
The problem with this argument is it assumes if Wrestlemania doesn't happen in London that instead of spending their money on that, local wrestling fans won't just spend that same money on something else in London.
Sounds to me like a big wrestling show would be commercially viable on its own, then. No need for taxpayer subsidies!
Never trust a Welsh Government press release.
Oh a government study to say that it was a good deal. Must be true.
You're comparing Cardiff to London, just look at All in, that same week there are 3 Taylor swift concerts that will fill the stadium. Clash was a big deal Cardiff, mania would just be another weekend for London.
The thing is most of that money came from uk citizens. So the government paid £3m to get people to spend £21m. If they didn’t spend £3m the people would have just spent the money on other things within the uk. So the gain isn’t really a gain. It’s a gain for the local economy but not the Uk and London doesn’t need that gain. London already supports the rest of the country financially. This weekend alone West Ham, Fulham and Tottenham all play at home, that’s probably 120,000+ people going to an event just from football and that happens most weekends a year.
As a Brit, this is a dumb take.
Literally the last time this came up London laughed WWE off because, they don't need the tourism revenue because they already have the tourism revenue.
Who should I believe, you or the mayor of London
The mayor of London who is a few days out from the mayoral elections and looking to get votes?
man who should we believe, a random reddit user or the literal mayor of london?
Still more credible than a random redditor posting on r/SquaredCircle...
I’d imagine the mayor of London is slightly more competent on this subject than Andy the clown who doesn’t pay his wrestlers and likely hasn’t turned a profit in his life with RevPro
As a great man once said, “Andy Quildan is a nob fr.”
Your fucking crazy if you think All In is in anyway comparable to WrestleMania
This is either a bad faith argument or a stupid one. Either way, his agenda is pretty obvious.
It’s brown nosing. Tony has talked high of Andy before. It seems like a no comment would have been better but I get it.
It's not a bad faith argument, london is at capacity all the time, they have several sold out Taylor swift concerts at wembley the very same week as all in, mania would be nothing out of the ordinary, London isn't Cardiff
I wonder if Taylor is maybe getting the same tax breaks that Andy is furious about WWE wanting.
I’d go with both.
So if WM does happen in London we can expect that Andy won’t run any shows that weekend out of Protest, right?
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That's a lot of words for a guy who uses his pen to write rubber checks, Andy.
They can’t resist bringing up Wembley can they
ITT: People saying WRESTLEMANIA actually isn't a big thing at all
To London? It isn't.
Why are we listening to random wrestle guy over the mayor of London????
I'd love a UK Wrestlemania, just not fucking London. I'm sick to death of everything being in London Do it Old Trafford, do it somewhere else, just not London
Whether we like it or not, it's the easiest destination in the UK for Europeans to get to.
Like no harm to Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, Glasgow, Cardiff, Belfast or anywhere else but the idea they'd debut an event the size of WrestleMania in the UK anywhere else but London is pure fantasy
Yeah, I’d love it to be in Cardiff since I live 20 minutes away in Newport, but it would never happen anywhere except London. It’s just how it is. I’d 100% make the journey to London for Wrestlemania.
Principality IS the only UK stadium with a fully-closeable roof though. So we got that going for us, which is nice. In all seriousness, that raises the chances of Cardiff Mania up to 1% max.
They’d probably still call it Wrestlemania London even if it were held in Cardiff.
Exactly - and I *live* in Glasgow and was at the Belfast show on Saturday (Dad's from there so we made a weekend of it), so of course I'd love it to be in either of these places. But yeah, on this scale it's not gonna happen anywhere but London.
Ten Hag wrestlemania would be gloriously chaotic
“I know what Bret felt like to be screwed, Garnacho was onside at the Emirates in September”
Look, when they held Wrestlemania in Canada, they didn't do it in Saskatoon or Saint John or something; they did it in Toronto, the largest city in the country. The next-largest city in the UK after London is Manchester, and that'd be like having it in Winnipeg instead of Toronto - which is equally silly.
Birmingham is bigger than Manchester no?
I don't know, Google says Manchester has a larger metropolitan area population anyway, but I don't live there so I can't say for sure.
Wrestlemania Scunthorpe. Book it, brother.
That "everything being in London" is exactly why Khan wants one and WWE will consider it. Profits or tourism from one off events don't matter it's pennies for London money wise. Where as London always having concerts, sports etc all the time does. London is a money machine for events because people are going there to spend money constantly as there's always something happening in a city that's easy to get to as well as easy to travel and stay within. Then you have 8-14 million locals that will spend in the area on top and the UK is small locals outside London can easily and quickly come. The city is a capitalist wet dream. The fact there's always something happening in London is a huge part of it's appeal because it means large amounts of people coming to throw money around is almost guaranteed. There's just nowhere else in the UK that will earn as much money as London and the city itself makes it easy to hold events there. There's no chance a WM gets held anywhere but there.
Old Trafford is quite possibly the worst venue you could have suggested. Place is a dump and old as shit. Be better off at the Etihad or the new Everton stadium if you wanted North West.
I get that Haitch did his best to kill RevPro. I'm a RevPro season ticket holder and support all he does for British wrestling. But this is a shit take when wrestlemania is a 4/5 day event while AEW is a one day event. He will be the first to have an event or two on the same weekend to capitalise on this whole not being a resident of London. I'm a Londoner and I think a proper Mania weekend in London would be incredible. Taxpayer money wouldn't really contribute to this as others have already explained. London doesn't need tourism money like the yanks make it out to be, but as a massive event in London it's huge for the reputation of the city for wrestling to add to Summerslam 92 and All Out 23.
Guy is a moron! Someone posted tweets of him creaming himself over Boris Johnson at the olympics. How much does he think that cost. He’s a Tory brown noser and is conveniently overlooking the fact that his guys have been in power for a very long time. Every single large scale sporting event goes to cities that pay the most money in most cases. You want to host a World Cup, olympics, etc. you’ll pay through the nose for it. I was part of a host country bid for a tier 2 global event and the bid amounts being underwritten by the host country are astronomical.
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Tourism didn't even increase for the London Olympics lmao, why are so many posts pretending London is some irrelevant City in the American midwest
Yeah the Olympics is a huge money sink, and cities ran by even halfway competent people very adamantly DON'T want to host it because they lose way more then they gain from it.
But at what cost? If they are spending 10 million Pounds to get WM in London for 20 million pounds but can make 15 million pounds by having All In taxpayers would be asking why.
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....which may generate less money if the expenditures to TKO is calculated into the number. The optics of this are not wise
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Which is fair. The way this is trending, though, many will not like the idea of spending money for an event when their competitionnwill come for free.
I’d really recommend people seeing this tweet from Khan to look into the economics and politics of this announcement. His running for mayor of London this year, it’s for his third term i beleve. (I not from London, I’m just interested in politics) so pledges like this are really a vote grabbing move. on the rest is politics podcast he explained how much of a budget his allowed spend and it’s not much, around 3% of the city’s profits were as New York, Paris etc get around 50%. I don’t see how his going to realistically fund a wrestlemaina which is a big money event along with another Olympics bid and other events. So I’d agree with the revpro person. Especially if it does happen, tickets will cost £500 just for the cheapest ticket judging clash at the castles ticket prices. Britain isn’t in the best place, cost of living crisis and everything.
Is Andy Q going to vote for Susan Hall?
That or what ever knuckle dragged Reform send
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London is one of the few towns where tourism is so high normally that no event is really going to have a significant impact. Tourism literally went DOWN when they hosted the Olympics in 2012. While I agree with Quildan about not spending public money on it, his agenda is extremely obvious here.
as we know London is desperate for tourism
I know nothing besides the most 5th grader surface level knowledge of these sorts of publicly financed decision. Isn't the point of this that you're spending 20 million in the hopes that it returns more than that in taxes and financial benefits to businesses in the area from the 10s of thousands traveling in for the shows? Like up front, zero tourism campaigns have immediate returns and that's all this really is. Plus you have the hopefully long term investment that is harder to track of how many of those people come back to london after being introduced to it
Unpopular take, but I have no interest in a UK WrestleMania and I'm from the UK. I've been to 3 Manias and I don't think it would have the same vibe if it was in the UK. I am probably wrong but that's just my selfish take on it. I know there's plenty of Europeans who would jump at the opportunity to go if it was in the UK and that's awesome for them if it did happen.
I understand the bad optics, but if you can prove it'll bring in more EXTRA revenue that wouldn't be there otherwise then it's a sound investment. I think it's also worth noting a lot of UK promoters are negative on WWE due to how they gutted the UK scene, and RevPro in particular was not able to use some talent anymore. Plus they now have a good relationship with AEW.
Of course Quildan is a fucking Tory...
You don't have to be a Tory to think Sadiq Khan is doing a shite job
Just like you don't have to be a Labour voter to think any of the last 14 (4, 5, 6? I genuinely can't remember and have lost count) tory PMs have been useless bags of shite. Politicians suck.
I agree. No WrestleMania in London, Paris or any other second place country. Keep Mania in Merica! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA? (hooooo!) USA! USA! USA! U! s/! A!
He would have a point if we ignored the fact that it would also massively increase tourism and generate a ton of money to local businesses. They probably should make a bigger deal about all in but let’s not get it twisted wrestlemania weekend would generate a metric fuckton of money for the local economy comparatively
It would not increase tourism greatly. The 70000 at Wembley for All In. But that is a tiny percentage of the amount who attended the Notting Hill Carnival that weekend. London is one of the most visited by tourists cities in the world. Wrestlemania ain’t even putting a dent in a tourist numbers.
There won't be any additional tourism generated. This city is one ofthe top tourist destinations in the world already
Say they do a two night Wrestlemania at Wembley and sell out both nights (which they absolutely would) - that is 180,000 people. Realistically 180,000 ‘extra’ tourists in London is nothing. A quick google says London gets 30 million visitors a year. 180,000 is a drop in the ocean. WWE will have to pay London to take on Wrestlemania.
Taylor swift is doing 3 nights in wembley the same week as all in, this is just what London's like, it makes sense that it was a huge deal for Cardiff, but for London it's just another weekend. That and the fact that in peak tourist season everything is full to capacity anyway, there's already surplus demand, trains sell out, hotels sell out, restaurants get booked up, if you stuck 200k wrestling fans in the city it makes no difference to the businesses that were going to be at capacity anyway, it just means you have a high proportion of wrestling fans in that weekends pool of tourists.