Will Ospreay makes his much anticipated return to action against Blake Christian. Plus, Darby Allin takes on Gabe Kidd in a coffin match. You can catch AEW Dynamite LIVE on Wednesday night at 8 p.m. ET/ 5 p.m. PT on TSN2, the TSN App, and TSN.ca.
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“The Aerial Assassin” Will Ospreay vs. “Vanilla Baby” Blake Christian (w/ “Big Shotty” Lee Johnson)
For the first time in nearly seven months, Will Ospreay will be in action in an AEW ring on Wednesday night’s Dynamite from Fresno, CA. The two-time former AEW International Champion made his shocking return at Sunday’s Revolution pay-per-view.
Following AEW Continental Champion Jon Moxley’s successful defence of his title in an exhausting and hard-hitting match against Konosuke Takeshita, Ospreay emerged from the back and immediately beelined for Mox and the rest of the Death Riders. Recall it was the Death Riders who put Ospreay on the shelf last summer with a neck injury that required surgery and months of rehab.
But before the former IWGP Heavyweight Champion can get his hands on Moxley and his crew, he takes on Blake Christian on Wednesday night. Christian and Ospreay are familiar foes and there are more than a few shades of Ospreay in the in-ring work of the 28-year-old Christian. New Japan star El Desperado has said he sees Ospreay in Christian in the way that both possess aerial ability, technical prowess and a certain fearlessness in the way they put their bodies at risk on a regular basis. The two men have met on several occasions in the past with Christian yet to pick up a victory over Ospreay.
Wednesday night’s match will begin to answer some questions about Ospreay’s comeback. His neck surgery was a serious one and failing to address it would not only have compromised his career, but his quality of life, as well. What sort of adjustments to his style will Ospreay make to ensure this kind of injury doesn’t happen again? Will there be a hesitance to the way he operates inside the ring? Can Christian take advantage of his ring rust? We won’t find out everything on Dynamite, but at the very least, this is a can’t-miss match.
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Coffin match: Darby Allin (w/ “Freshly Squeezed” Orange Cassidy and Roderick Strong) vs. “War Ready” Gabe Kidd (w/ David Finlay and “100 Proof” Clark Connors)
Darby Allin’s war with The Dogs comes to a head on Wednesday night when he meets Gabe Kidd in a coffin match. The match could prove to be the end of a bitter feud that has raged for months and is an offshoot of Allin’s battle with the Death Riders. Once a hired gun for Jon Moxley’s crew, Kidd returned to AEW with Allin on his mind, but this time he was doing things for himself.
On last week’s Dynamite, Allin found a new and unlikely ally in his war. After the team of Allin and Orange Cassidy fell in tag team action against Kidd and David Finlay thanks to the interference of Clark Connors, The Dogs continued their assault on the duo. They motioned to to the back for somebody to come out and Roderick Strong emerged. It was the first time Strong had appeared on AEW TV since abandoning Cassidy in the middle of a match against Connors and Daniel Garcia last month. Sick of what he thought was the nonsense of Cassidy and The Conglomeration, Strong reached his apparent breaking point.
Implored to put the boots to Cassidy, Strong feigned doing so before taking out The Dogs himself. After clearing the ring, he assisted Cassidy to his feet and high-fived him in a mea culpa for his previous actions. Then at Sunday’s PPV, the trio of Allin, Cassidy and Strong defeated The Dogs when Strong pinned Connors after an End of Heartache.
While each man’s respective seconds will likely play a part in Wednesday night’s match, it still will come down to Allin and Kidd and the match’s stipulation. To win the match, one man must place his opponent in a coffin and close the lid shut. The match will be the first of its kind for Kidd, but Allin is a veteran at these. He will obviously have the experience edge, but things haven’t always gone his way in these bouts.
After reeling off victories in his first four coffin matches, Allin has lost his late two. At All In 2024 at Wembley Stadium, Jack Perry got the better of Allin to retain the TNT Championship. Then at last Sept.’s All Out in Toronto, Moxley defeated Allin in a coffin match thanks to the help of the returning PAC.
Kidd knows Allin is beatable in this kind of match, but can he pull off the victory?
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No -holds barred match: “Timeless” Toni Storm (w/ Luther) vs. “The Problem” Marina Shafir
If Toni Storm thought her Marina Shafir problem, pardon the pun, would be taken care of once and for all at Revolution, she was mistaken. A thorn in the former AEW Women’s World Champion’s side for months, Shafir met Storm in a match at the pay-per-view with everybody banned from ringside. After several minutes of beating the holy hell out of one another, Storm picked up the win after biting Shafir in the breast and rolling her up in a small package.
As Storm began to celebrate her hard-fought victory and head to the back, former UFC Bantamweight Champion Ronda Rousey, and close friend of Shafir’s, hopped the guardrail and entered the ring. She motioned for Storm to come back and meet her there. Before she could, several referees and security guards got in between the two women. The confusion allowed Shafir the opportunity to sucker Storm from behind and leave her unconscious.
Shafir’s blindside attack has precipitated a no-holds barred match on Wednesday night between the two women. While Storm will undoubtedly relish the opportunity to once again put her hands on Shafir, the nature of the match opens up a whole can of worms. Should they choose to, the rest of Shafir’s Death Riders can get involved with impunity. And what about Rousey? Will the “Baddest Woman on the Planet” make her presence known again? And just what plan does Storm have to counter these potentials?
