AEW World Champion Will Ospreay meets David Finlay in a Title Eliminator. Plus, Britt Baker is in action for the first time in nearly two years and Steven Borden makes his Dynamite debut. You can catch the action LIVE on TSN2, TSN.ca and the TSN App.
AEW World Title Eliminator Match: AEW World Champion “The Aerial Assassin” Will Ospreay vs. David Finlay (w/ IWGP Global Champion “War Ready” Gabe Kidd and “100 Proof” Clark Connors)
For the first time since becoming AEW World Champion at All In, Will Ospreay is in singles action. His opponent is somebody he knows quite well and doesn’t particularly like in The Dogs’ David Finlay. Should Finlay manage to defeat Ospreay, he earns himself a rematch and this time it’s for his title.
The rivalry between Ospreay and the third-generation star goes back over a decade to New Japan Pro-Wrestling. A product of the famed Dojo, graduating as a Young Lion alongside Jay White, Finlay first did battle with Ospreay in the spring of 2016. Their first few matches were tags and multi-man encounters. In October of that year, Ospreay defeated Finlay in their first singles match at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo. Their one-on-one matches have actually been few and far between. Ospreay holds a 3-1 edge with Finlay’s lone victory coming in the 2022 G1.
But one of the biggest victories of Finlay’s career came against Ospreay. At Wrestle Kingdom 18 at the Tokyo Dome in 2024, Finlay became the inaugural IWGP Global Heavyweight Champion in a three-way match against Ospreay and Jon Moxley. Ospreay appeared to have the match won, laying out Moxley with a pair of Hidden Blades and a Stormbreaker. Before he could pin Mox, though, Finlay reemerged and planted Ospreay with Oblivion. For good measure, he then lifted Ospreay up and hit an Overkill to get the win.
Finlay has proven he can beat Ospreay before and there’s no way that Ospreay is yet 100 per cent after his war with Kenny Omega at the pay-per-view. On top of that, Ospreay knows that he has a title match with Moxley set for All Out on Sept. 26 in Chicago. This could be the perfect storm for Finlay to earn himself a title match and he knows it.
Can a compromised Ospreay focus on the task at hand or will an opportunistic Finlay get one step closer to the AEW World Championship?
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AEW World Trios Championship match: Swerve Strickland and The New Level (“Awesome” Austin Creed and KOFI) (c) (w/ Prince Nana) vs. The Conglomeration (“Freshly Squeezed” Orange Cassidy, Roderick Strong and Kyle O’Reilly)
For the second straight week, the AEW World Trios Champions are putting their titles on the line on Dynamite. After fending off a spirited challenge from The Rascalz (Zachary Wentz, Dezmond Xavier and Myron Reed) last week, Swerve Strickland and The New Level (Austin Creed and KOFI) take on former champions in The Conglomeration’s Orange Cassidy, Roderick Strong and Kyle O’Reilly. Wednesday night’s matchup presents an interesting clash of styles and it also comes at an interesting moment for the challengers.
That Strong can be temperamental isn’t news to anybody. A passionate grappler, Strong has had very little time for nonsense over the course of his career and maintains an intense focus on his craft in a way few others do. Sometimes that can create personality conflicts for the former ROH World Champion.
While the seemingly nonchalant nature of The Conglomeration has been a sore spot on multiple occasions for Strong, he seems particularly irritable at present. When he lost to O’Reilly during the Continental Cup, he shoved his longtime friend to the ground afterwards. In his defence, he quickly composed himself and apologized, but this past Saturday night on Collision, Strong stormed off during a backstage interview in another fit of annoyance. A charitable reading of what’s going on with him right now is that he’s desperate to hold AEW gold once again.
With their first successful defence in the bag, Strickland, Creed and KOFI remain well aware that lengthy trios reigns aren’t all that common in AEW. The previous champions (“Hangman” Adam Page, Bandido and Brody King) only made a single successful defence. The team they beat, The Demand (Ricochet, Toa Liona and Bishop Kaun), lost the titles in their first defence. They don’t want to be next.
Will The Conglomeration get their titles back or will Swerve, Creed and KOFI continue to reign?
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Tables match: The Young Bucks (Nick Jackson and Matt Jackson) vs. The Don Callis Family (“The Protostar” Kyle Fletcher and “The Jet” Kevin Knight) (w/ Don Callis and “The Murderhawk Monster” Lance Archer)
This match kind of came out of the blue on Saturday night’s Collision and all four men set to take part in it might be a little bit confused as to why they’re there, but they will all be out to win. The match is, in fact, the work of Don Callis, who lobbied for it in a fit of pique. As much as fans loathe the Winnipeg native, they’re going to be thankful that Callis is putting the Jackson brothers and Kyle Fletcher and Kevin Knight in the same ring.
On Collision, The Young Bucks faced off with Don Callis Family team of Brian Cage and Jake Doyle. In a matchup of speed versus size, the three-time AEW World Tag Team Champions emerged victorious. The Jacksons got the pin on Doyle with a Superkick Party followed by a BTE Trigger.
Enraged by the result, Callis vowed to get revenge on the Bucks one way or another and we discovered what his plan was during the show’s main event. In the closer of Saturday’s show, the Family duo of Fletcher and Knight defeated the Bang Bang Gang’s Juice Robinson and Ace Austin. While the match was competitive and hard-hitting, the major talking point coming from it was that Fletcher and Knight couldn’t get along.
Actually, that might not be accurate. They didn’t want to get along. Each man used his time in the ring to one-up the other. That discord culminated in the finish of the match. Fletcher nailed Austin with his sheer-drop brainbuster, but was totally unaware that Knight had tagged himself in. So just as he was about to go for the pin, Knight flew in with a UFO Splash to get the three count himself, much to Fletcher’s incredulity.
Former champions who both lost their respective titles at All In, Fletcher and Knight both have a point to prove right now, both to each other and the rest of the locker room. Neither man will phone in the opportunity to beat one of the greatest tag teams of all-time in the Jacksons. But would Fletcher or Knight lose any sleep if he saw the other go through a table on Wednesday night? Probably not.
With putting your opponent through a table to win the match the name of the game, which of these two teams will pick up a win?
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TNT Champion Darby Allin and Steven Borden Jr. vs. The Don Callis Family (“Dunkzilla” Mark Davis and “The Walking Weapon” Josh Alexander) (w/ Don Callis and “The Murderhawk Monster” Lance Archer)
It’s a match of firsts on Wednesday night as Darby Allin and Steven Borden team up to take on Mark Davis and Josh Alexander. The match is Borden’s televised debut, while it also marks Alexander’s return to action after nearly six months following a serious knee injury incurred in the spring. The match is unlikely to be pretty.
At All In, Allin finally got the better of longtime rival Kevin Knight, defeating him for the TNT Championship. Allin is now in his record-tying third reign as champion. During the match, Knight was aided by his Don Callis Family stablemates, but Allin had back-up of his own in the form of the Bordens: Steven Jr. and Steven Sr., aka “The Icon” Sting.
The younger Borden has been training in wrestling for the past two years. He made his first AEW appearance during his father’s retirement match at Revolution 2024. While he’s wrestled in an AEW ring before, this will be the first on live TV.
The match comes in the wake of last Wednesday’s match between Allin and Davis. The hulking Aussie, looking to regain AEW gold after losing the AEW National Championship to Andrade El Idolo in July, took the fight to Allin for much of the match. Allin would eventually pick up the win with a pair of Coffin Drops.
After the match, though, the Family wasn’t finished. Allin was jumped by Roppongi Vice (Trent Beretta and Rocky Romero). With Romero and Beretta laying waste to Allin, Borden arrived on the scene to help even the odds. He took out both members of RPG Vice with picture-perfect dropkicks. Davis re-entered the picture and faced off with Borden, but it was only a ruse as the returning Alexander hopped over the guardrail to blindside him. Alexander then locked Allin into an ankle lock, while Davis planted Borden with Close Your Eyes and Count to F---, with the Family ending the night standing tall.
With revenge on their minds, Allin and Borden head into Collision, but will their quest for vengeance prove stronger than Borden’s inexperience?
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TBS Champion and CMLL World Women’s Champion Persephone, Dr. Britt Baker, DMD, and Hikaru Shida (w/ Rebel) vs. “The It Girl” Maya World, Hyan and Thunder Rosa
Wednesday’s Dynamite is the Rebel Heart edition of the show. The show will honour Tanea “Rebel” Brooks, who was diagnosed with ALS back in the spring. Rebel will make her return on Dynamite, co-hosting “The Waiting Room” with Britt Baker as they welcome the former AEW Women’s World Champion’s tag team partners later in the evening, Persephone and Hikaru Shida, as guests.
Baker made her shocking return to AEW at All In, assisting Persephone in capturing the TBS Championship from Maya World. While they seem like unlikely allies, the duo revealed that they bonded over their mutual hatred of Thunder Rosa. Baker and Rosa, of course, have had a heated rivalry over the course of their AEW careers.
This past Saturday night on Collision, Persephone made the first defence of her new title, defeating Vertvixen. After the match, World made her way down to the ring, but she wasn’t alone - she had Thunder Rosa in tow. Now on Dynamite, Persephone and Baker have drafted in Shida, while Rosa and World have the latter’s regular partner, Hyan, in tow for a trios match.
Wednesday night’s match will be the first time Baker has competed in an AEW ring since Nov. 13, 2024. She’s obviously going to be amped, but will there be any ring rust? And, if there is, how deleterious will it be to her team’s chances?
Which of these two trios will pick up a win in what should be a heated encounter?
