Toni Storm’s reign as Interim AEW Women’s World Champion will hit 75 consecutive days on Friday and while her reign is nowhere near the heights of current champion Thunder Rosa, Storm has already successfully retained the title three times while beating four other potential challengers in Eliminator matches. Storm openly called Rosa’s back injury into question shortly after she won the gold at the All Out pay-per-view and in a new interview with The Ringer she made the argument that Rosa should be stripped of the official championship if she’s off TV for much longer.
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“Personally, I think she should just come to work and defend her championship like she’s supposed to, like a champion should,” Storm said. “But if the injury lingers too long, I believe she should probably be stripped. And then I should be the AEW undisputed Women’s World Champion like I was supposed to be at All Out. That’s verbatim. I think she should defend her title. I think all champions should defend that championship. That doesn’t just go for Thunder Rosa. That goes for everybody.”
Storm vs. Rosa was originally supposed to happen at All Out before the latter pulled out of the match due to injury. Rosa appeared on Busted Open Radio back in August and discussed the extent of her injury — “I want to clear the air, this is not fake. This is not a work. I’m not comparing injuries to injuries. If I could f—ing walk, I can f—ing work. Doctor Sampson, he didn’t clear me to wrestle. I’m not cleared to wrestle. It’s not that I don’t want to do a match on Sunday [AEW All Out], I can’t walk. It’s a shame that this is being put on social media, not only to discredit me as an athlete, but also discredit me as a wrestler. I want to walk when I’m 40. I have the right to say ‘No, I can’t walk, I can’t do it.’ I don’t want to have surgery. If we keep doing this and going through the pain, then I’m going to be out for longer. I don’t want to do that.”
She then appeared on the same show again in October and responded to Storm calling her injury into question — “I’m saying it’s January and I hope it is January. And again, if Toni Storm disagrees with what was decided in the back, that is not my problem. When I get better, I will still be the champion if my boss lets me be the champion. If he doesn’t, I will be okay with that decision too. Because I don’t make the rules and that needs to be said.”
