Roderick Strong beat Hechicero to become the new number one contender to fellow AEW star Claudio Castagnoli's CMLL World Heavyweight Championship.
Strong has been at odds with Castagnoli in AEW for months as part of the wider conflict between The Conglomeration and The Death Riders, and in December he beat the CMLL World Heavyweight Champion in the Continental Classic to prevent his advance to the finals. Now he will have the opportunity to go against him for the title after making good on his CMLL debut at Viernes Espectacular on Friday, defeating recent AEW-CMLL dual signee Hechicero after sixteen and a half minutes.
Strong first faced Castagnoli in singles action in the 2006 CZW Best of the Best tournament, with Castagnoli getting the win on that occasion. Strong then got two victories over Castagnoli for the FIP World Heavyweight title in 2007, before Castagnoli got two more victories in PWG in 2008 and 2010 respectively; Castagnoli beat Strong once more in October before their Continental Classic bout in December last year which.
Altogether their record stands at 4-3, with a litany of multi-man matches against one another including the 2025 Men's Blood & Guts match and the Mixed Nuts Mayhem match at Worlds End.
Castagnoli has been CMLL World Heavyweight Champion since dethroning Gran Guerrero in November, and has since then defended the title on one occasion in December against Ultimo Guerrero.
