A great deal of The Owen Hart Cup tournament will be taking place in “The King Of Harts'” home country of Canada, but there happens to be no Canadian representation in either bracket.
On Wednesday’s AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door 2 media call, Tony Khan was asked by Bill Pritchard of WrestleZone about that “lack of Canuck” occurrence and what the thought process was behind booking both brackets. Khan gave an answer that he was aiming more for match-ups rather than the country of origin.
“I wanted to give the strongest field possible and I feel like we put together a really, really strong field with some of the top stars in AEW and some great names and this is something we’re really going to be doing year after year, the Owen Hart Tournament and tried to pick the best eight wrestlers on each side that were available on all the dates and to create the most compelling match-ups for TV and PPV and as you said, I think the bracket was well-received and people are really excited about the match-ups.”
Tony Khan Says There’ll Be More Opportunites In Future
Tony Khan continued to put over the possibilities for AEW in Canada, stating that he’d like to continue future Owen Hart Cups up in the “great north.”
“There’s great opportunities for more and more Canadian stars to get involved in these events too and as it stands right now there’s great international representation in the tournament and I think both the men’s tournament and the women’s tournament are going to be excellent events and I’m very excited for them culminating in Calgary.”
The full brackets were announced on “AEW Dynamite” and the first bout of this year’s tournament will take place on Friday’s “AEW Rampage” as Skye Blue will aim to win once more in Chicago as she takes on Anna Jay in the first round fight. AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door 2 will also play host to some tournament match-ups as CM Punk will take on Satoshi Kojima and Billie Starkz will seek victory against ROH Women’s Champion Athena.
Please credit Inside The Ropes for the transcription.