On the January 13 episode of AEW Rampage, Willow Nightingale teamed with Ruby Soho in the main event to take on Anna JayAS & Tay Melo in a street fight.
The battle was a bloody affair that received some criticism from fans who said they were turned off by the blood coming out of Ruby Soho's head and questioned a spot where Willow overshot the table when powerbombing Anna off the stage.
Speaking to Renee Paquette on The Sessions, Willow reflected on the match.
"Very emotional," she said. "The toughest part for me, is that I like to uphold my work and what I do in a wrestling ring to a certain standard. That includes the way I execute moves, the safety of my opponents, and generally if I feel like it clicked. How it flowed, did it feel right? At the end of the match, I definitely knew that it was something very special. Obviously, Ruby was bleeding like crazy. I looked at her and was like, 'You look awesome,' right in the middle of the match. I am like, 'What a badass.' Then, the table spot with Anna. That has been a big thing. Before getting anybody's response to it, it was a thing where, when I walked back through the curtain, I was immediately like, 'Where is Anna? Is she okay?' She was like, 'I'm fine. I'm going to the doctor right now, they have to check me out, but I'm okay.' 'Are you sure?' Checking with everyone else, talking to our producer and they take us back and stuff. Those were the two things I was most worried about. It left me very emotional because I felt like I was just worried about the other people I was in the ring with and I don't think that I had upheld the elements that I expect from myself."
The bout was taped on Wednesday, leaving two days between when fans in the arena saw it live and when fans would be able to watch on television. It also left two days for Willow to think about how the match would be received.
"Anytime I'm on Rampage, there is a second wave of anxiety that hits. Yes, there is the show day chaos and you're wrapped up in everything you're doing, but before you go out, you get the butterflies. 'It's showtime, time do the thing, I don't know how it's going to be,' and then it's over. Then, you have to wait two more days to wait and see how everybody reacts and it's gut wrenching, 'what's the response?' That's a different nerve," she said.
Some fans claimed to be offended that Soho bled as much as she did, believing that women shouldn't bleed so much, if it all, during matches.
Willow commented on the criticism by saying, "We are honestly all very excited to be given the opportunity to do something like this. Anna and Tay have already done this a year ago on television. They had a lot of fun with it. There are limits on how grotesque it's allowed to be. I can only speak from my experience, I don't know if this is the case with other matches, other tag matches, men's wrestling, I don't know what those conversations are like. I only know the conversation we had. For us, it was one person from each team was allowed to bleed. We all wanted to get our hands dirty and do crazy stuff, but it was 'we can't go overboard.' 'Okay, understood.' We didn't have to worry about it because Ruby bled enough for everybody. I thought it was awesome. I thought she looked killer, she thought she looked great. She had to get stitched up after. I held her hand as they injected everything. 'Oh my God, you're so tough.' We were really excited about everything. I think if people are getting their panties in their bunch about it, that's the least of your concern. We bleed every single month, nobody talks about that. I'm sure if that had happened, people would make a big deal about that. If someone were to bleed through their gear. We bleed the same as men do. We take the same bumps, we're at the same risk as they are. I don't understand why there has to be a double standard about physically seeing blood."
Willow & Ruby were victorious in the bout.
Willow competed on Wednesday's AEW Dynamite, losing to Toni Storm after a distraction from Saraya. After the bout, Storm & Saraya attacked Willow before Ruby made the save.
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