Tony Khan was caught off-guard by recent criticism of AEW made by Bill Goldberg.

During a recent interview with Josh Martinez of Superstar Crossover, the AEW and ROH President was asked about recent comments made by the aforementioned WWE Hall of Fame legend during a 93.7 The Ticket radio interview last week, where he called the AEW product “cheesy” and said he would never work for the promotion.

“Bill wanted to work here,” Khan claimed. “I met with Bill several times. Bill was looking to work here. It’s funny because I had a bunch of really nice meetings with Bill and would have honestly been interested in doing something. I have a lot of respect for Bill. I was surprised by that because that certainly wasn’t what he said to me when he was talking to me about working here at some point, which I’ve always been open to and I really like Bill. It’s all about timing and we’re doing a lot of exciting things right now. Sting just finished up and went out on his own terms doing things he liked and felt strongly about. I know Sting and Bill are good friends. I really like Bill and have respect for him.”

Khan continued, “When I saw that, Bill has talked to me about working here, so I don’t think he had any problem with any of that content and anyone who saw Sting’s send off has had positive things to say. I’m not sure what that was about, but I do respect Bill and I like him very much. I wish him the best and God bless him. He’s a great name in wrestling. I love what we do in AEW, and he’s entitled to his opinions. Certainly, when I talked to him in-person, several times, in-person and in Zoom and phone calls, we’ve had very nice conversations, and he hasn’t said that. It’s good to know that’s how he feels and maybe that’s an opinion he holds now, but certainly in our past conversations he’s always been a positive and nice guy.”

Check out the complete Tony Khan interview with Josh Martinez of Superstar Crossover at iHeart.com. H/T to Fightful.com for transcribing the above quotes.