"Looked like guys in the first day of wrestling school"- Jim Cornette hammers Tony Khan's AEW for the Forbidden Door pre-show

Wrestling veteran Jim Cornette voiced his displeasure at Tony Khan's promotion regarding the pre-show matches at the Forbidden Door pay-per-view.

AEW and NJPW's cross-promotion event turned out to be a smashing success for Tony Khan's company. The star-studded event delivered on its promise to be an exciting, action-packed event. The show featured 4 pre-show matches as well, out of which 2 matches in particular featuring Max Caster and Lance Archer respectively were heavily criticized by Cornette.

Speaking on the Official Jim Cornette YouTube show, the veteran podcaster weighed in on two specific matches on the pre-show:

"Lance Archer had a singles match with Nick Camarado, who we haven't seen on television for two years. There was a 8-man with the Guns and Caster against four guys I swear to god looked like guys in their first day of wrestling school. Where did they find those guys from? They put trainees in front of 16,000 people and broadcast it such as it was on the countdown program. Why do that?" (2.17-3.05)

Cornette further gave his two cents on the culture of pre-show before pay-per-views:

"I tried to put an end to it (in ROH) whenever possible but it was an ingrained part of the culture there that you should've pre-show matches involving trainees or greenest guys. I said why would we wanna open the show with that? Well no, it's not opening the show, its pre-show. What?" (3.24-3.32)

Jim Cornette dissects Tony Khan's move to include a pre-show on pay-per-views like Forbidden Door

Pre-show culture has been a hot topic of debate around every major pay-per-view. It got a polarizing set of opinions recently, where some voiced support for Tony Khan, for giving some performers an opportunity while others didn't deem it as important in context.

While the Forbidden Door pre-show featured stars like Lance Archer, Max Caster and Keith Lee, it did also feature younger wrestlers from NJPW's LA Dojo and Suzuki-gun.

During the same show, Cornette further dissected Tony Khan's decision to include a pre-show on Forbidden Door. He also opined that trainees should be kept eluded from them:

"If bell time is 8 o'clock, we send those guys out at 7.15 while the people are getting in their seats, they're watching two or three pre-show matches and then we start the show. They're in front of the people that have brought tickets and have come to see the show, they're part of the f***ing show. We don't need to put a guy that's in a wrestling school for three weeks on the opening match." (3.33-4.08)

What's your take on Forbidden Door's pre-show matches?

Please credit Official Jim Cornette and give a H/T to Sportskeeda when using quotes from this article.