Arthur Ashe Stadium Comments On Issues From First AEW Grand Slam

By Eric Mutter

One of the biggest announcements to come out of last night's AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door PPV was the reveal that AEW will be bringing back the AEW Grand Slam at Arthur Ashe Stadium on September 21. The event will see episodes of "AEW Dynamite" and "AEW Rampage" taped from the world-famous tennis arena, and preparations are already underway to make this a great experience for fans.

On early Monday afternoon, Andrew Zarian tweeted out that he had recently spoken to a reliable Arthur Ashe stadium contact, who gave Zarian the following statement.

"We are very much aware of the issues last year regarding the concession stands and don't expect the same issues this year," the statement read.

Following last year's Grand Slam event, many fans brought up issues with the Arthur Ashe concessions. The criticism ranged from the stadium lacking the appropriate amount of staff members for the high-capacity event to the staff on hand being unable to properly serve customers.

Despite the issues, both the "AEW Dynamite" and "AEW Rampage" episodes of Grand Slam were considered a financial and critical success, with AEW drawing over 20,000 fans for the events, the largest attendance for any AEW show to date. The "Dynamite" portion of Grand Slam notably featured Bryan Danielson taking on then AEW World Champion Kenny Omega for the first time since 2009, with the two stars wrestling to a 30-minute draw.

Following the event, AEW owner and CEO Tony Khan confirmed that he would be looking to run an AEW Grand Slam event annually at Arthur Ashe Stadium. Shortly after the show, the stadium bought an ad in the Sports Business Journal to thank the promotion, Khan, and AEW vice president of live events/touring Rafael Morffi for bringing the largest wrestling crowd to the New York area in over a decade.

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