TNA today announced that they have signed Nick Aldis, a British wrestler who has made a name for himself over the last year as ‘Oblivion’ in the UK version of Gladiators. The signing is part of TNA’s continued plans to expand their coverage in the UK.

The company recently signed Doug Williams to a contract and of course next January sees them return to the UK for an ambitious tour that takes in dates at the Manchester Evening News Arena, Birmingham’s National Indoor Arena, Braehead Arena in Glasgow, Scotland and London’s Wembley Arena.

TNA have announced the names who will be involved on the January tour, which include Kevin Nash, Mick Foley, Kurt Angle and Jeff Jarrett. In fact, the only major names not to be making the trip to the UK according to a press release issued this week are Scott Steiner and current TNA World Champion, Sting. Without wanting to be overly critical, I do find it strange that even though Sting doesn’t work house shows in the States, TNA wouldn’t push him into working the tour in a market that is already lucrative to them. Plus, it makes sense to have your champion on these shows.

Although his appeal to hardcore wrestling fans may be minimal, Aldis’ signing could actually turn out to be a smart move on TNA’s part, if only for the UK tour. Gladiators has been doing healthy ratings on Sky One since its revival and without doubt more people will recognise Aldis from his role on the show than from his wrestling background.

Ever since TNA announced plans for their first UK tour earlier this year, I’ve said that they have the potential to outdraw WWE this side of the pond. Good numbers for January’s tour will likely mean another tour later in the year and there has already been discussions held about taping Impact from the UK at a later date.

With the move to HD in the States on Spike TV, broadcasting Impact in HD in the UK may not be a huge priority, but it should be something for TNA to consider. Right now, they are airing over here on Bravo, who as far as I’m aware have no plans to launch a HD channel in the near future.

By the end of this year, UK fans will have access to thirty HD channels (largely all via Sky) and by this time next year we’ll likely have around 50 HD channels. By then, I’d be expecting Setanta Sports to be offering a HD channel (they already record live football in HD for broadcast in other countries) and it wouldn’t surprise me at all if TNA follow the UFC at some point and end up on Setanta.

TNA will also be advertising on Virgin Media’s website in the near future. Virgin Media are the owners of Bravo TV. It wouldn’t surprise me at all to see TNA programming become a feature on Virgin’s Video On-Demand service for cable TV subscribers. TNA already offer a VOD service for subscribers to BT’s broadband VOD TV service.

For more details on TNA’s upcoming UK tour, visit www.tnaliveuk.co.uk.

Phil Lowe
Phil@ifight365.com