2002 - A Trip Down Memory Lane

It's the time of the year when everyone looks back at the year that was and Newsflash is no different. It is time for the review of the WeBL year 2002:

David Ellis kicked off the year by bringing the first WT of 2002 back to Scandinavia on January the 3rd. It was his 7th title at the time and he went on to win 10 more which makes him the top Scand fighter of all time. He had a memorable rivalry with Sten Haard (Flat Out) and they fought 8 times in the space of 4 months. The prestigous battles ended in a head-to-head at 4-4-0. Haard went on to win 5 WTs with four of those coming from defeating Ellis.

Haard and Ellis are both retired since the summer but Scand has another legend who is still active: Abrianna La Bianca! She started the year in style by winning her first WT against the most legendary fighter to come out of the Prodigal gym: Jerri Maguire! Maguire has 20 WTs and a record of 45-3-2 with LaBianca being the only fighter to ever defeat him in a WT fight. LaBianca enjoyed a long retirement during the summer months but has notched up 15 WTs during the year and set a new WeBL record of going 29 straight contender fights without defeat.

The Olympics at the start of the year saw Scandinavia send a team consisting of captain Anfield along with his crew: Flat Out, Pitypart, punch, foxxx, Gazza, Slaughterhouse, Les Miserables and Blizzard. The goal was to defend the previous year's gold. However, after a poor start it looked like a bottom half finish was beckoning. Honour was restored after a strong finish with gold for punch, silver for foxxx and bronze for Slaughter meant a joint 4th place for the team. It is also notable that the now dominant DRoA only got into the Olympics through the Renegade team but fell at the first hurdle.

The main Olympics was closely followed by a junior version for gyms who didn't make the main event. Scandinavia sent a very strong team with skipper pym and his gang of vikings: Stampy, HRulez, Rebellion, Mixus Punchline, Aggerud FC, Aggerud ZE, Bonk and Vinterviken. It was a success story from start to finish with pym setting the standards in the first round with a memorable win against, perhaps the strongest manager in the tournament, Pasoa. The captain went on to win gold and Stampy did the same. Mixus got a silver medal and the overall win for Team Scandinavia was a fact.

Many gyms won their first WT during the course of the year. It started with DRoA and For you Aggerud ZOO on May 19th. DRoA has since then bagged in a total of 33 WTs with 6 different fighters and must be considered the best gym in Scandinavia. Both ZOO and Dr Dandryer Ekelund have won 10+ WTs and are still going strong. He won the Manager Of the Month Award all the way from April to September!
Back to the subject of winning first WT though. Only 5 days after ZOO did it he was followed by Les Miserables' Peevish Pete who won the flyweight belt.
A week later it was time for foxxx and his heavyweighter Main Eventer who defeated Gee Ahn (House of Compassion).
After a slow summer Peter Saaf from Aggerud FC went all the way in super-welter and Bonk's Peekabo blah soon followed by becoming the first Scand cruiser world champ.
SMH crowned his fantastic autumn by taking Hagbard Handfaste all the way to the top and has 4 WTs right now but is still looking for more.
Last and least we have myself who thanks to tnt-Phantom Lord won my first WT on the now holy date November 1st.

Regionals has also had its fair share of memorable moments with TheMythologyWillWinTheTitleEventually (HRulez) finally winning his desirable title after an astonishing 65 fights. Les Miserables and Flat Out had a race on who could reach a 100 RTs first and I think LM got it in the end but it was a close call. SMHs monopoly on RTs during the late autumn and DRoA winning the Ant Race is also worth mentioning. In PRs HRulez has been made to work hard by Hands of Vecna as to who gets the Smack Award each month. But all this is nothing compared to the absolute highlight of regionals this year. I am of course referring to the fight between Francico Bojado (No Leaf Clover) and Ulf Ottosson (DRoA). Let me take you back to March 18th and explain why:

Bojado had flashed his way to a perfect 13-0-0 (13/0) record and needed just one more win to reach contenders. If he made it he would become the first undefeated Scand to reach contenders with only KO wins. However, he is not the hero in this drama. Speculation was mounting before scheduling about who could move weight division to try and stop Bojado's quest for the record. The public opinion was that he must be stopped since flashers are looked down upon by the average Scand. In the end it was Ottosson who stepped down all the way from super-light to super-feather in an attempt to put things right. However, moving divisions like that meant he changed fight day from Tuesday to Monday and this got his manager all confused, and DRoA forgot to give him new instructions. The previous week, Ottosson had fought a Svett och Blod sissy and therefore his tactics was allouting to the body. So allouting to the body was just what he did against Bojado, who himself was allouting in a flash attempt. The fight lasted 11 seconds and provided 23 stuns! Bojado obviously won and got his record but the IPs were devestating. Ottosson got IPs in bucketloads too and both fighters careers were destroyed. This was the birth of the underground movement B.A.R.F! Ottosson became a hero for the way he had sacrificed his career for the greater cause of stopping a flasher. Books will be written, movies made and monuments built to his honour. Since then B.A.R.F has become world famous and no flasher can be safe from this underground movement. Little is known about the Brotherhood but what we do know is it's out to stop flashers and it has many supporters throughout the community. The mystery surrounding it is partly the reason why it has reached cult status.

Well that was making a short story long but back to rest of the year.
The tournament after the junior Olympics was the WICT where yours truly got the bronze after losing to Peekabo in the semis and then beating Pure Power in the bronze fight. The Christmas Tourny wasn't much of a Scand success although Hoops and Anfield both did well. The best Scand was pym who defeated Anfield in the semis of the qualifying tournament but was unable to make it to the final 8.

Other highlights that deserve a mention here is PityPart's great work with this site and the transformation it took which brought Newsflash to the world. Also, pym's stat-o-matic that many of us play around with on a regular basis has enhaced the WeBL experience.

The downside of the past year was the tourny loss against UKS and also the fact that so many managers retired. It started with LGD and then in close succession Les Miserables, Gazza, AZE, AFC, Rebellion and Mixus Punchline all left. Thankfully new gyms have also arrived with the likes of Parre, Rotmo, Borge, Nick's Naughty Ninjas, M@mm@ and Ogrus. This together with the many talented managers we already have makes the coming year something to look forward to. 7 new managers won their first WTs last year, can we match that this year and who will it be? Will LaBianca pass Ellis in most number of WTs? Or maybe ZOO or Dandryer will do it? So much can happen in a year. Bring on 2003!