A FORMER WWE wrestler has spoken of his excitement at getting back in the ring in the UK ahead of his show in Newport.

Scott Garland – best known as Scott Taylor and Scotty 2 Hotty in the WWF and WWE franchises – will be returning to Newport for the first time in seven years next month to make his in-ring debut in the city.

“I’m so excited,” he told the Argus about his return to the city. “It’s been seven years but it feels like it has been longer than that.”

On Sunday, March 6, Mr Garland will be performing in the ring at the Neon in Newport for Exposure.

“I’ve never wrestled in Newport yet, my previous appearances have been signings only," he said. "I’ve worked with Nigel (Fleming, owner of Exposure Wrestling Entertainment) before and he’s a great dude.

“Since I was last there, they’ve got the Exposure academy now and I’m looking forward to seeing that as well and I’m doing two seminars on the March 7, the day after the show.”

The 48-year-old had, until recently, been coaching the future WWE stars at their performance academy in Orlando, but wanted to be back out on the road and back in the ring, so in November, he decided to pack in the role, leave WWE and take on the world again as an independent wrestler. Mr Garland had his first show back on January 1 and has been performing across the USA each weekend. He begins a two-week tour in the UK and Ireland on March 4.

MORE NEWS:

“I’m in the best shape of my life,” he said. “I don’t know how many more years I have in me to give my all for the fans but I also did not expect that all these years later, I would be booking shows across the world.”

He praised the UK fans with their energy and enthusiasm for all the in-the-ring shenanigans – and social media for allowing wrestlers to get their best opportunities.

After the pandemic hit, we weren’t travelling around as all our shows were being done in-house at the performance centre and that was not what I got into wrestling for," he said.

“I wanted to travel and see the world and still do. I saw Matt Cardona was going independent and he looked like he was having so much fun. Now with social media, we can promote ourselves.

“I’d post a ‘appearing soon’ show announcement and then another promoter would contact me and then another, and I would end up with all these bookings.”

Mr Garland began wrestling around the age of 15, after working on the independent circuit in the US, he made his WWF debut while still in high school in October 1991 where he wrestled under the name Scott Taylor.

He is most well-known as Scotty 2 Hotty, part of the ‘Too Cool’ tag team with ‘Too Sexy’ Brian Christopher. In 2000, he held the WWF Light Heavyweight Championship and the pair became WWF World Tag Team Champions.

In 2004, he also won the WWE Tag Team Championship with Rikishi. He was released in 2007 but returned a number of times for one-off matches. He wrestled on the independent circuits across the world before returning to WWE in 2016 as a coach at the performance centre.

You can see Scott Garland in the ring at The Neon in Newport on March 6, find out more here: https://www.facebook.com/ExposureEntertainment