Tuesday is French Catch Day: Prince! Noced! Batman! Klondyke! Montreal! Le Comte! Calcard! Magnier!

Petit Prince vs Daniel Noced 6/6/74

MD: This is the cliff notes version of the touring 74 Petit Prince match, so it's not unlike things we've seen befoe, but it's such a great show. I love the contrast with Noced, who's just a mean jerk. He can feed into and base for all of Prince's stuff, but his own offense is just slamming his head into the mat in a hammerlock or lifting him to the top rope and hammering him. He's a mean bullying bastard and that makes it all the better when Prince runs circles around him. You get all of the big marks: the headlock go behind takedowns, the cartwheels, the back flip off the top, the amazing entry into the short arm scissors, but also just enough selling on the outside during a king of the mountain and a big spirited comeback and a clever stunning move to win. This was less than 8 minutes from bell to bell and it feels like something that can stand up with the best Rey Jr. TV matches along those lines. French Catch is so much more than just the quick exchanges, but this feels like the perfect tiny dose of Petit Prince to show someone reluctant to dig in just how special he personally was.

Klondyke Bill vs Batman 6/6/74

MD: This was a great piece of business. This is the UK Klondyke Bill, though he was billed from Canada. The rep he had was that he was a more athletic (though still massive) predecessor to the giants that would come a few years later in the UK, a guy who could go 30 (or 6 rounds) even if he never made it to the biggest stage at home. You get a real look at that here. Great use of the girth in general, with Batman just bouncing off of him, and earning every shot he got. He'd pry fingers away only to get pressed into the ropes and tossed. Bill would toss these belly bumps at Batman and he'd just bump halfway across the ring for them as the fans went nuts. He'd certainly antagonize the ref, shooting him across the ring as well. He had some gnarly holds too including a sort of a stump puller where he put all of his weight on Batman or just a toehold that looked nasty due to his size. He wasn't afraid to bump big off things you wouldn't expect either though, but he did it on the back half of the match after the tide had turned. Likewise, he'd go to cheating when he lost an advantage. Ultimately he'd get DQed for abusing the ref but the fact this went a smooth twenty with a number of different beats and holds and sections was a testament to how he was a step above his super heavyweight peers.

Jean Pierre Le Comte & Mr. Montreal vs Bernard Caclard & Fred Magnier (JIP) 7/11/74

MD: Nice to see some different guys in this one. We get the last two falls, as the stylists had taken the first one. It felt like one of those AJPW tags where you have one wrestler like Hansen or Spivey who can really assert themselves and know how to handle things and then another foreigner who doesn't quite get it and gets eaten up, so it becomes a tale of two matches. Or Harley Race. Have you guys ever seen Harley Race in an AJPW tag? He manages to be in the ring for about twenty seconds before losing the offense to literally anyone he's wrestling. Anyway, that was Le Compte here. He had the look of a poor man's Van Buyten and had some pretty good stuff when he got to show it: a nice cartwheel, a flurry of dropkicks, some hard shots, but he spent most of the match, when he was in getting destroyed.

And when Montreal was in, he was completely unbeatable. He looked more like Lou Ferrigno than ever here. Early on he did the strength spots, just overpowering every top wristlock and front facelock attempt. When he came in later it was about slamming and bearhugging and bodyscissoring his frustrated opponents. Le Compte took his beating well and sympathetically at least, and Magnier and Caclard were game. Magnier (the Mercenary of the Ring) has that sort of doughy bruiser bodytype that reminds you of Dick Murdoch (or Robert Gastel) and he can really lay it in with high/low shots, knees and stomps. Caclard was slimier and haughtier and more the little dog to Magnier's big dog. When Le Compte was in they controlled the ring and kept him in the corner and on the rocks. So there was some drama on whether or not Montreal could get back in and what sort of revenge he'd get when he did, but I still wouldn't call this a balanced match, even if the crowd did enjoy it.