AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door 2023: World Championship Matches confirmed

Bengaluru, June 15: The joint pay-per-view venture between AEW and NJPW, known as Forbidden Door 2023 is barely ten days away in the calendar. It's now been confirmed that both the top world titles from these two promotions will be defended on the show.

As seen during this week's Dynamite, a promo aired featuring the current IWGP World Heavyweight Champion SANADA as he issued an open challenge for Forbidden Door 2023 to come after his title.

The promo specifically mentioned that anyone on the AEW roster should try to come and take his title. Later on Dynamite, Jungle Boy Jack Perry accepted the challenge, and the title match was made official.

SANADA won the IWGP world championship from Kazuchika "Rainmaker" Okada at Sakura Genesis on April 8 in Tokyo. Before that win, he left Tetsuya Naito's Los Ingobernables de Japon stable to join the Just Five Guys.

Most recently, SANADA defended his title on June 4 at Dominion in Osaka against Yota Tsuji. As for Perry, he unsuccessfully challenged for the AEW World Championship in a four-way match at Double or Nothing.

Also, during this week's episode of Dynamite, it was announced that MJF would be defending his AEW World Heavyweight Championship against top NJPW star Hiroshi Tanahashi. It came after Tanahashi appeared in a promo to lay down a challenge.

"MJF, as long as you're champion, the belt doesn't shine like it should. Last year at Forbidden Door, I came this close to beating [Jon] Moxley for the AEW title. So this year, at Forbidden Door, MJF, face me one on one."

On Dynamite, AEW World Champion MJF vs. Adam Cole in a Title Eliminator Match ended in a 30-minute time-limit draw. Cole asked for the match to go down for five more minutes to draw a conclusion but MJF declined.

Afterward, AEW interviewer Renee Paquette informed MJF that AEW CEO Tony Khan had made the title match official for Forbidden Door 2023 with Tanahasi being his next challenger. MJF was unhappy with this and he threatened to no-show at the PPV.

MJF last had a successful title defense at Double or Nothing 2023 in late May in a so-called Four-Pillars Match where his opponents were Jungle Boy, Darby Allin, and Sammy Guevera. He won the title back at Full Gear 2022 in November.

AEW x NJPW: Forbidden Door 2023 pay-per-view takes place at the Scotiabank Arena in Toronto, Ontario, Canada on Sunday, June 25. The matches confirmed for the upcoming cross-promotional event are given below:

- Bryan Danielson vs. Kazuchika Okada

- IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship Match: Kenny Omega (c) vs. Will Ospreay

- IWGP World Heavyweight Championship Match:

SANADA (c) vs. Jungle Boy

- AEW World Heavyweight Championship Match: MJF (c) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi