Saraya will be making her long-awaited return to in-ring action this weekend after confirming she was been 100% cleared by doctors to return to the squared circle.
Formerly known as Paige in WWE, Saraya was forced to retire from professional wrestling in 2018 due to suffering a serious neck injury.
But almost six years on from her last match in WWE, the British superstar will make her comeback to in-ring competition when she takes on Britt Baker this Saturday at AEW’s Full Gear event.
Saraya Was Determined To Return To The Ring As A Singles Superstar
Saraya has revealed in a recent interview with Chris Van Vliet that AEW President Tony Khan originally offered to put her exclusively in tag team matches in order to protect her, similar to how AEW utilise Sting in multi-person matches.
However, the ‘Anti-Diva’ was determined to step back in the ring in a singles match:
“So I asked Tony about it. And at first he was like, well, maybe we can do tag matches, depending on how cleared you are, you know, kind of like how we did with Sting. And I was just like, Yeah, but like, if I was to come back, I would want it to be like a singles match. I feel like that’s such a big deal. Not that I didn’t want to work with the rest of the girls, I was just like, if I wanted to come back, I just had this dream in my head that it will be a singles match.”
Saraya also revealed that she took it upon herself to contact her own doctors and make sure she was 100% cleared before making a decision on returning to the ring:
“And so I took it upon myself to be like, Alright, I’m gonna go to a non-wrestling doctor. Nothing to do with WWE, nothing to do with AEW, just a doctor as like, doesn’t have like [bias]. I know doctors are not supposed to be biased, but that was in my head. There’s zero bias if I go to someone outside of wrestling, because this time around, if I was potentially able to get cleared, I would want it to be because I’m 100% ready to go. Not because they’re like, well, maybe we can squeeze her in these and these matches. Like I know, I want to be 100% ready.”
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