Original Plans for Several NJPW Wrestlers for AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door 2026

This past Sunday’s AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door 2026 event in San Jose, California featured only Shota Umino, Shingo Takagi, Drilla Maloney, and Zack Sabre Jr. from NJPW competing at the event. AEW CEO Tony Khan had mentioned during the media scrum prior to the event that visa issues had affected the availability of several wrestlers that were originally planned to be on the show.

Dave Meltzer reported in a recent episode of the Wrestling Observer Radio that his sources stated that among those who were originally planned for Forbidden Door was former IWGP Heavyweight Champion Callum Newman. Meltzer reported that AEW officials original plans were for Newman to challenge Jon Moxley for the AEW Continental Championship prior to Newman suffering a dislocated shoulder injury at NJPW’s Dominion event earlier this month. This reportedly led to the change of Bandido being Moxley’s opponent for the event.

In regards to the IWGP Global Heavyweight Championship match at the event, Meltzer reported that the original plans were for Gabe Kidd to be the challenger for Umino but was unable to travel for the show due to visa-related issues. This reportedly led to the change of PAC being Umino’s opponent for the event.

AEW officials reportedly also originally had plans for Tomohiro Ishii to compete at the event but he was written out in a storyline attack angle several weeks ago to cover for a neck injury. Ishii likely would have been part of the 12-Man Steel Cage match that featured other members of The Conglomeration for Mark Briscoe’s team.

Besides NJPW talents, Meltzer reported that Sareee was also originally planned to work AEW’s co-promoted Forbidden Door event. Meltzer speculated that Sareee likey would have challenged Willow Nightingale in the Finals of the Women’s Owen Hart Foundation Cup tournament. These plans were changed due to Nightingale suffering a shoulder injury before the start of the tournament and Sareee not being medically cleared in time by AEW doctors over her neck injury issues. Nightingale was later replaced by Mercedes Mone and Sareee was replaced by Maya World in the tournament.