Kingston defends NJWP Strong title on Rampage on TSN+
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Eddie Kingston puts the New Japan Strong Openweight Championship on the line against CHAOS' Rocky Romero. Plus, The Acclaimed and Billy Gunn defend the AEW World Trios Championships against the Hardys and Isiah Kassidy. You can catch AEW Rampage on Friday at 10pm et/7pm pt streaming on TSN+.
New Japan Strong Openweight Championship match: ROH World Champion Eddie Kingston (c) vs. NWA World Historic Welterweight Champion Rocky Romero - Rocky Romero has the opportunity to quickly end Eddie Kingston's reign as a double champion by becoming one himself. The new ROH World Champion, Kingston defends the New Japan Strong Openweight Championship on Friday night against Romero, who is already the NWA World Historic Welterweight Champion. Kingston became a double champion at Grand Slam last week when he defeated longtime rival Claudio Castagnoli for the ROH title. He previously claimed the NJPW strap with a victory over KENTA in Philadelphia this past July. Romero earned his welterweight title back in January while competing in CMLL by defeating Volador Jr. at Arena Mexico. Romero is no stranger to NJPW gold, having previously held the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship (as Black Tiger) and the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championships a record eight times (with Davey Richards, Alex Koslov and Trent Beretta). Kingston and Romero have met just once before in singles competition with the former picking up the win in October of 2021 in a match for DEFY Wrestling in Los Angeles. The backdrop to Kingston's second defence of the NJWP Strong title is what us is on the horizon should he retain. If he manages to defeat Romero, Kingston is set to put both the ROH and NJPW Strong straps on the line at Sunday night's WrestleDream pay-per-view in Seattle against ROH Pure Champion Katsuyori Shibata. Can Kingston make his second defence a successful one or will Romero ensure that he only has one title to defend on Sunday night?
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AEW World Trios Championship match: The Acclaimed ("Platinum" Max Caster and "The Five-Tool Player" Anthony Bowens) and "Daddy Ass" Billy Gunn vs. The Hardys (Matt Hardy and Jeff Hardy) and "Brother Zay" Isiah Kassidy - Matt Hardy and Jeff Hardy have amassed countless titles over their illustrious careers, but there aren't any trios championships among them. That could change on Friday night when the duo teams with "Brother Zay" Isiah Kassidy to take on The Acclaimed and Billy Gunn for the AEW World Trios Championships. Max Caster, Anthony Bowens and Gunn are the just the fourth threesome to hold the titles. having defeated the House of Black (Malakai Black, "Big, Bad" Brody King and Buddy Matthews) for the titles at All In last month. Since then, they've successfully defended the titles on three occasions, turning aside challenges from "Daddy Magic" Matt Menard, "Cool Hand" Angelo Parker and Jake Hager, "The Last Outlaw" Jeff Jarrett, Jay Lethal and Satnam Singh and, most recently, the Dark Order (Evil Uno, John Silver and Alex Reynolds) on last week's Grand Slam edition of Rampage. The match on Friday will feature the Hardys facing off once again with an old foe in Gunn, who took on Matt and Jeff on a number of occasions over the years alongside the Road Dogg. There are few wrestlers in AEW with the championship pedigree that the Hardys have, so will they be able to add yet another to their collection?
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AEW Women's World Championship No. 1 contendership match: Hikaru Shida vs. Ruby Soho - Already a two-time champion, Hikaru Shida will get the opportunity to fight to become the AEW Women's World Championship for a third time should she get by the challenge of Ruby Soho on Friday night. The winner of the match on Rampage will face off with current AEW Women's World Champion Saraya on the special Title Tuesday edition of Dynamite on Oct. 10. Since dropping the title to Saraya at All In in a four-way match that also include Britt Baker and Toni Storm, Shida hasn't been able to get back into title contention. She missed out on a shot at Saray at Grand Slam by falling to Storm in another four-way that also included Baker and "The Native Beast" Nyla Rose on the Sept. 13 Dynamite. Her opponent on Friday night, Soho, has also found gold elusive thus far in her AEW career. In fact, after her loss to Kris Statlander for the TBS Championship at All Out, Soho is now 0-5 in AEW in matches with titles on the line. A win over a distinguished former champion in Shida could go a long way to build up here confidence...and set up a potentially awkward match against Outcasts stablemate Saraya. Friday's match will be the first ever singles encounter between the two women. Soho owns a 2-1 mark in the three tag matches in which the two have previously met. Which of these women will be in line for a shot at gold on Oct. 10?
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PLUS:
- Ahead of their handicap match for the ROH World Tag Team Championship against AEW World Champion Maxwell Jacob Friedman at WrestleDream, The Righteous (Vincent and Dutch) will be in action.