Claudio Castagnoli earns title shot against AEW Continental Champion Kazuchika Okada
Image: AEW
The next challenger for Kazuchika Okada’s AEW Continental title is set after Claudio Castagnoli won a three-way on Saturday’s Collision in a title eliminator.
Castagnoli defeated both Tomohiro Ishii and ROH Pure Champion Lee Moriarty in a three-way to earn the right to challenge Okada. Castagnoli got the pin after pulling Ishii out of the ring following a sliding clothesline to Moriarty followed by him then landing a sliding forearm strike on Moriarty for the win.
The date and location for the title match has yet to be announced with this month’s All In at London’s Wembley Stadium potentially a candidate.
The victory helped turn Castagnoli’s recent fortunes around as he was eliminated in the first round of this year’s Owen Hart Foundation tournament, was unsuccessful in a four-way International title eliminator bout, and was unable to unseat AEW World Champion Swerve Strickland this past April.
While Castagnoli has held the Ring of Honor World title, AEW gold has eluded him during his multi-year run in the company.
For Okada, it will be just the third defense of the title he won back in March from Eddie Kingston and his first since mid-May.
Since 2011, Josh has been a contributing editor to Wrestling Observer/F4WOnline.com and also hosts the Punch-Out podcast. He has also written for Fight Magazine, Bloody Elbow, Bleacher Report, and other websites. He's a 2000 graduate of the University of Maine, worked in pro sports, and once was an indie ring announcer.