Tommaso Ciampa Reflects On Match With Kazuchika Okada, When He Knew They Had Chemistry

Tommaso Ciampa weighed in on his match with Kazuchika Okada at AEW All Out and how quickly he knew they had ring chemistry. The two faced off at All Out for Okada’s AEW International Championship late last month, a match that even saw Ciampa’s daughter Willow get involved when she flipped Okada the double bird in response to Okada flipping her off.

Ciampa spoke about the match during his interview with Adam Bernard for The Sportster. He noted that he knew right away that they were going to click in the ring and knowing the Willow moment would get fans into the bout. You can see the highlights below:

On When He Starts to Imagine That a Match Will Click With Fans:

“Yeah, I think there’s a couple different times that it’ll happen through the day. More often than not, when the early conversations are done being had, and I can kind of walk away and just kind of envision it all on my own. And kind of try to — because I do a lot more envisioning than I do anything else as far as, I’m not trying to memorize what I’m going to say or do as much as I try to just see it, and then when I’m out there I kind of just insert myself.

“Anyways, there’s that point in the day typically, is when I’ll start to go, ‘Oh, this has a really good flow to it. This part of the match is going to get a really good reaction. And I think if we ride that part of the match the rest of the way through, like this could be [great].'”

On His Match With Okada:

“That’s what happened with Okada. It was a point whether 5, 6, 7 p.m. where I remember just sitting alone and going, ‘Okay, let me just really play this whole thing out in my head.’ And knowing what I had planned with Willow and everything, I was like, ‘Okay, that’s the tide shifter. And if that hits the way I think it’s going to hit, especially with Chicago.’ I was like, ‘If that hits, this is going to be really good.’

“Plus, you hope that you have chemistry. Me and him have never touched prior to that. And then I would say during the match itself, very very early in the opening two lockups, I immediately went, ‘Oh, okay. We’ve got really good chemistry.’ Like, just the way he feels. There’s people I’ve locked up with and went, ‘Oh, okay. [chuckles] We’re in for it tonight.’ And there’s people I’ve locked up like, ‘Oh, I feel like we view this the same way.’ Or we, whatever. Maybe train the same way.”

On When He Knew They Had Chemistry:

“So there was a very early moment where we did a couple lockups and I was like, ‘Oh, we have really good natural chemistry.’ And then when the Willow instant happened and I heard the crowd, I was like, ‘Oh.’ We haven’t even got into — like at that point, we hadn’t done one false finish, pin, nothing.

“So I said, ‘Oh, we got him. Like, this is going to be [good]. And I had a very good feeling that was going to be the case. It was Chicago; it’s Okada, first time matchup. First time matchups are my absolute favorite thing in pro wrestling. So I think it just we had a lot of things in our favor.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit The Sportster with a h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.