Michael Oku is ready to make headlines with his match with Will Ospreay.
On February 18th at RevPro High Stakes, Will Ospreay will compete in his final independent match before he joins AEW on a full time deal. His opponent is one he is all too familiar with, as he will face off with Michael Oku for the British Heavyweight Championship. The match will come with a twist however, as there will be no referee stoppages, and only Amira can throw in the towel for Oku in the upcoming title defense. Sitting at 0-2 against Ospreay, Oku is ready for his shot at redemption.
While sitting down for a recent interview with Fightful's Corey Brennan, Michael Oku was asked about his upcoming trilogy bout with Ospreay, noting that he aims to make headlines by defeating Ospreay in his final match.
"Yeah I think it's one of those things. First of all, I think he truly does want to finish things off. It's not like a contractual situation of 'you're not allowed to wrestle here forever anymore.' But I really think that he's trying to think what's best for himself, his career, his body, his family to no longer do the indies. I really appreciate that I'm the last match because it could be anyone. There's loads of people that are in the scene. But the match that makes the most sense, I think, to fans and I think to Will, is for it to be me. Of course, the last two matches were losses. So it would just be a cool headline for me personally as a wrestler and for my career. If the headline is that I'm one of the few people who has a victory over Will Ospreay, which is the case for the last few years and if it's its final match in the indies, that's kind of what would be cool for me."
Michael was then asked what the two additional stipulations add to the match for him, noting that he wanted the match to be at its core a match where the better man will walk out the victor.
"So, of course, one of the biggest parts about that second match that me and Will had two years ago was that it was so emotionally driven. My family is ringside, but also my girlfriend, Amira, is there ringside and her being brought into it, I think, took the match to another level in terms of not just a great Will Ospreay match, because he had great matches earlier that year. He made it in the Tokyo Dome. Then he had loads of crazy matches throughout 2022 and has done since. So I think that's one of the reasons why people, even though he's had a plethora of matches around the world, people come back to this match as one that stands out to them because of that added element of Amira. So I think for me, when I was thinking about, it's time for the third match and just as a wrestler, it's like, we do have to try and see if we can live up to the second match. What makes the most sense is, the no referee stoppages just staying because there's no point in going backwards, that not being the case anymore we're going back down. It's always trying to think, how do we add another stipulation? How do we escalate things? But I didn't want it to be a thing of taking away the idea which is just about professional wrestling. It's like, who's the better professional wrestler for me, it's such a big thing when the stories still revolve around beating someone in professional wrestling match. So we could have tried to probably get Andy to find a budget for Hell In the Cell or a Ladder match, but but i think it's something so important that it's still just boiled down to its core. It's just a singles match, a one-on-one kind of affair but then still have Amira adding something and like an element of doubt in terms of what she'll do and people wondering what she'll do as well as adding some questions over to how the match is going to end."
Oku has been champion for over 200 days, and will look to hold his title past February 18th.
In another interview with Fightful, Amira spoke at length about the upcoming match and noted that beating Ospreay is the one thing Michael has been missing. You can read more about that here.
