Crown Jewel match card has gone through a lot of changes. The absence of some marquee players on the show caused these alterations. Roman Reigns will not compete in the Universal Championship match after relinquishing the title. Hence, this is going to be a singles contest. Braun Strowman and Brock Lesnar will compete for the vacated title.
Must read: Replacement of John Cena at Crown Jewel
Daniel Bryan will not go to Saudi Arabia for the Jamal Khashoggi controversy. Hence AJ Styles will face Samoa Joe while defending the WWE Championship. John Cena is another name who denied to work in the Crown Jewel PPV. Hence, the World Cup tournament bracket also went through changes as confirmed on this week’s WWE Raw.
Bobby Lashley became his replacement in the upcoming tournament. However, this is not the only change that happened in this first-ever series at Crown Jewel. PWInsider.com reported that the initial plans for the world cup tournament were something much different. Raw superstars were about to go against the Smackdown stars.
But later the officials kept it within their own brands. As disclosed on WWE Raw, superstars from the red brand will take on their own superstars and so will the Smackdown stars. This will set up the final match where we will see a brand vs. brand match at Crown Jewel. Miki Johnson of the source disclosed the reason behind doing so,
“The original plan was to kind of have the talents mixed up. In fact, at one point we were told that John Cena was going to wrestle Rey Mysterio in the first round and then the decision was made to keep the Raw and SmackDown talents segregated until the final because the final would also serve as sort of a preview of next month’s Survivor Series which will have a Raw vs SmackDown theme.”
We expect this world cup tournament will become a huge success at Crown Jewel. Meanwhile, the tickets for the event were on sale this past weekend. It was sold out within three hours. The Chairman of the General Sports Authority posted to Twitter reporting the same. This indicates excitement about the show in Saudi Arabia.
Women can also make history at Crown Jewel as we might get Renee Young on the commentary table. Pro Wrestling Sheet reported that Saudi Arabia authority might have allowed her to call down the actions from ringside. So this will be the first time that someone female will do commentary in a wrestling show in the country. We will see if it becomes reality when the show goes on air.