In a recent interview with The Wrstling Podcast, Japanese women’s wrestler Ryo Mizunami, with the aid of a translator, discussed several topics including her appearances for All Elite Wrestling, wanting to work in the United Kingdom and more.
Highlights of the interview are below:
On her appearances for All Elite Wrestling: “So everything just happened in a flash so, it only hit her of the magnitude of what had been accomplished (winning 2021 AEW Women’s World Title Eliminator tourney) when she looked back at it later but in the beginning, the tournament in Japan, it was at a venue where she knew, wrestling people she knew so it really didn’t hit her that this was gonna be a big deal. But then when she went to the States, she first wrestled Nyla Rose on TV. So that’s when it really hit her first, before the pay-per-view when she realized she was gonna be on live American TV and then she beat Nyla, going onto the pay-per-view (Revolution). At the time, she didn’t even know what pay-per-view meant, she didn’t even know what a pay-per-view was so you know, she was just focused on going in there, having a good match and winning the belt but after everything was done, she’s like, ‘Oh my God. What have I done?’ The magnitude was just unimaginable but it only hit her afterwards. But, that experience has helped her greatly in forming what she wants to accomplish as a wrestler and how she wants to perform as a wrestler so that experience is being levers even to this day right now.”
On wanting to work in the United Kingdom: “Yes, she does wanna go back to AEW. Yes, there is a lot of unfinished business in AEW and in the U.S. in general but, her current focus/desire is the U.K. actually. Millie McKenzie and Nina Samuels were in Japan at the end of the year last year and they were working Sendai Joshi and Mizunami saw them and said, ‘Wow.’ They felt like a new breed, sort of a hybrid of the Japanese and the U.K. style and she saw them and said, ‘Wait, if I go to the U.K., there’s more of wrestlers like these? I gotta go to the U.K.’ so, that’s her goal right now is she wants to go, she hopes that she goes there and meets a bunch of new wrestlers in that breed that will help her expand her horizons as a wrestler too so, in conclusion, yes, do AEW, America, of course but, you know, the focus at the moment is the UK.”
The full interview is available at this link.