Mark Andrews Discusses Benefits Of TV Exposure To British Wrestling Through NXT U.K.

Mark Andrews spoke with the They Are NXT podcast to give his take on how having a platform for British wrestling the likes of WWE NXT UK is great for the growth of pro wrestling. Check out the transcript below courtesy of Wrestling Inc. 

NXT U.K. Platform:

“[TV exposure] was really important because I come from a generation of wrestlers in the UK where there hasn’t always been a spotlight on us. I know when I started back in 2006, when I was 12/13, there wasn’t really anything on TV. I mean you had a few, like FWA was on the wrestling channel and there’d be old reruns of World of Sport, but it wasn’t in the limelight much. It wasn’t in the mainstream. And obviously WWE, most of their roster would be kinda American at the time. You had the likes of William Regal, Fit Finlay; A few British guys were out there but there wasn’t really a booming scene like there is now so to first get television exposure,” Andrews continued, “to actually be seen worldwide was huge for me. And even back then, at the time, there wasn’t many British wrestlers being on TV. You have guys like Drake Maverick who has broken out a little bit, Zack Sabre that has broken out in Japan, obviously Finn Balor, people like that. But there still wasn’t an entire scene being pushed, so it was really important [to get TV exposure]. And I think I was one of the few at the time to get TV exposure, and it’s funny, you fast forward now to 2018 and look at NXT UK!”

Talent:

“And now suddenly you see all this talent that almost feel like they’ve been hidden gems over the last 5 – 6 – or 8 – even up to 10 years. But I guess that’s because we’ve had such a strong scene over here in the UK and now we’ve had years and years of honing our craft, and now we finally get to be seen on the grand stage that is WWE. And I almost feel like, well I’m hoping, and I’m sure that the world’s almost a bit shocked like, “Where have all these British guys come from?” Where have they been this whole time? And now it’s nice to be on that platform for the world to see what we’ve been working on for the last 10+ years.”

After the success of yesterday's NXT U.K. Takeover: Blackpool, fans around the world are certainly paying attention to wrestling from across the pond. Let us know your take on Andrews' comments and yesterday's historic first ever NXT U.K. pay-per-view in the comments.