It has been one of the stories of 2015. Whilst creatively WWE has found itself in a complete rut, one group has stood tall as a beacon of light throughout the year. The most surprising thing to many is that the group is spearheaded by a man who would have been on a number of predicted future endeavour lists at the start of the year. I'm talking of course about Xavier Woods. When he arrived on the main roster in 2013, Woods was randomly paired with R-Truth, the dancing good guys that nobody cared about. He feuded with Brodus Clay over the use of Ernest Miller's music and the dancing Funkadactyls, and the entire thing was a washout from the start. This was winter 2013, and Woods did a whole lot of nothing until he approached Kofi Kingston and Big E in the summer of 2014. This led to the formation of The New Day. Initially a group of happy clappy babyface chappies, they slowly turned towards the dark side with heel tactics and disingenuous positivity. During all of this, Xavier Woods has developed into something of a modern day 'Mouth of the South' Jimmy Hart, running interference from ringside complete with trombone in hand. Xavier Woods is also one of the most accessible and viewed superstars outside of the ring, whether it is through his YouTube gaming channel UpUpDownDown, his various social media accounts or his general willingness to be open and frank about what he loves. So, to end the year, here are 9 things you may not have known about Xavier Woods.
Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.
