UPDATES ON PLANNED INTERPROMOTIONAL EUROPEAN CUP TOURNAMENT FOR 2007

This morning’s edition of UK tabloid The Daily Star have more on the 16-promotion tournament that we’ve been covering over the past week or so.

The tournament, called the King of Europe Cup, will take place on April 28 and 29 at the Liverpool Olympia in Liverpool, England, with Ring of Honor, PWG, CZW and IWA all confirmed as sending representatives from their promotions to compete for the King of Europe title.

The Liverpool Olympia was used earlier this year as the venue for Ring of Honor’s first ever show here in the UK, and was such a success that the venue (which holds around 1,700) is being used for ROH’s return to the UK next Spring, prior to this two-day event taking place.

Tournament organisers have opened a website at www.kingofeuropecup.com, which also reveals that many of the promotions involved will be holding qualifying matches to determine which wrestler is to come to the UK to be part of the tourney.

The plan is that the King of Europe Cup becomes an annual event with the same recognition that the ECWA Super 8 and King of the Indies events in the United States attract.

As well as the confirmed promotions taking part, four Japanese promotions are believed to be in talks with organisers (as we’ve previously reported this week on WrestleMag, one of those is Pro Wrestling NOAH), one Canadian promotion has been approached, as have WXW from Germany and at least three UK based promotions (1PW have definitely been approached but whether they will be involved remains to be seen, and as we’ve previously reported, IPW:UK are believed to be involved, which fits with ticket information later in this post).

Day 1 of the tournament will feature the eight first round matches, with all winners going into the Quarter finals the following day, while the second day will feature the remaining tournament matches as well as featuring more matches involving those who were eliminated out of the tournament the previous night.

The tournament will also feature a new concept in giving prize money away for the best matches of the night. Tournament organisers are pushing this as a new way to strengthen fan-wrestler interaction, with fans being asked to give voluntary donations either on the night or in advance via the website, with proceeds being added to a $1000 match of the night cash prize which will be donated by event organisers who are giving $500 away each night for that night’s ‘Match of the Night’.

Tickets will be available from October 30th via IPW:UK's official website at: www.IPWUK.com and www.KOEcup.com and are priced from £10 per night for upper balcony seats right through to £130 for a two-day Gold Ringside ticket which includes free entry to a IPW:UK promoted pre-show, free entry to a event signing session and free event poster. Various sponsorship and VIP packages costing from £350 to £2250 are also available. For further information check out www.kingofeuropecup.com.

WrestleMag will be on hand in Liverpool on April 28 and 29 for full live coverage of both night’s of the King of Europe Cup, and we’ll have the latest news regarding the two day tournament right here on the News & Results section of WrestleMag.com, as we get it.