Saraya On What She “Absolutely Would Not Tolerate” In Future Matches

AEW star Saraya opened up about needing to change her wrestling style and the one thing she will not tolerate in future matches.

Saraya is set to face Dr. Britt Baker, D.M.D. at AEW Full Gear on November 19th. This will mark the first time Saraya has competed inside the squared circle since late 2017, when a serious neck injury forced her to retire from competition.

Speaking to Renee Paquette on The Sessions, Saraya opened up about needing to be cautious in the ring after being medically cleared to compete again.

“I wasn’t too crazy before when I wrestled, I would do a lot of mat work and that kind of stuff. I did love taking a bump. That was my favorite thing, to take a bump. I’m not going to be bumping like crazy. There is going to be bumps, I can’t just go into a match with zero bumps.”

Continuing, Saraya talked about not taking moves from behind unless they’re incredibly controlled. Back in 2017, a kick from Sasha Banks on a house show caused the neck injury that forced her to retire.

“I’m fully aware of stuff I can’t do when it comes to anything from behind. That’s more of a PTSD thing too. ‘Please don’t do anything from behind.’ That’s something I absolutely would not tolerate. That would piss me off. Until I’m fully comfortable with something, don’t do anything from behind when I’m not aware of it. if it’s something you’re going to call, a forearm across the back and stuff, I’m talking about like a kick or something you could easily lose control over. That’s something I have to be cautious of.

“For the most part, the bumping, I’m doing some training and the bumping is different. I have to adjust how I did it because I was a person who would just fling my body back and it would be mostly neck. I have to learn how to flatback bump properly without creaming or killing myself.”

“This match is a big moment. People haven’t seen me wrestle in five years and they’ve only seen me wrestle in a WWE capacity.”

Elsewhere in the podcast, Saraya made it clear that she doesn’t blame Sasha Banks for her neck injury. In fact, Banks was the first person she texted upon learning that she was medically cleared.

h/t Fightful