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The former Cesaro, Claudio Castagnoli, officially debuted for All Elite Wrestling tonight at the Forbidden Door PPV in Chicago as the newest member of the Blackpool Combat Club, facing New Japan Pro Wrestling's Zack Sabre Jr. as Bryan Danielson's mystery man.
As PWInsider.com broke back in February, Castagnoli quietly exited WWE after his contract expired. He last performed for WWE on 2/11 under the Cesaro ring name, losing to Happy Corbin on an episode of Friday Night Smackdown. The two had been in negotiations but did not come to terms on a new agreement. One source at the time noted that WWE did offer Cesaro an extension on his current deal but that was turned down.
Castagnoli, 41, had been with WWE since 2011 when he inked a developmental deal with then-WWE developmental territory FCW. Over the course of his run with the company as Cesaro, he won the first-ever Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal at Wrestlemania 30 and had a run with the WWE United States Championship as well as Raw and Smackdown Title runs with Sheamus, Shinsuke Nakamura and Tyson Kidd. He defeated Seth Rollins at Wrestlemania 37 in Tampa last year.
While Castagnoli had a long WWE run, he was also consistently underutilized during his tenure there. Among fellow talents, he's always been universally considered one of the best and toughest in-ring performers by any definition of the word.
Prior to his WWE run, the Swiss star had a tremendous run as one half of the Kings of Wrestling with Chris Hero in Ring of Honor, Pro Wrestling NOAH, CZW and CHIKARA.
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