One of the few remaining mysteries heading into WrestleMania 33 lies in the Smackdown Women’s Championship match. After a knee injury forced Naomi to hand over her title and Alexa Bliss defeated Becky Lynch to become a two time champion, SmackDown general manager Daniel Bryan revealed that at WrestleMania, Alexa would defend her Women’s title against every available female star on the blue brand.
The vagueness of the announcement left us to believe there might be a woman on the roster who we don’t normally see competing every Tuesday night. While some speculated this might mean Naomi would be well enough to return and win back her title in her hometown of Orlando, others thought we could see the return of Eva Marie.
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This weekend’s SmackDown LIVE event may have given away the answer we didn’t see coming. As the roster was competing at Madison Square Garden, NXT Women’s Champion Asuka replaced injured Naomi as she teamed up with Nikki Bella, Tamina and Becky Lynch to take on Carmella, Alexa Bliss, Mickie James and Natalya.
Rumours suggested that Asuka was one of the names being discussed for a main roster call-up the night after WrestleMania, but it’s possible it could happen even sooner. A twitter user noticed that WWE originally tweeted out an image announcing Asuka was coming after Alexa’s Championship, then quickly deleted it and replaced it with a mention that she had only made an appearance.
So WWE initially teased Asuka coming after Alexa, then revised it to just mention she made an appearance at MSG. Interesting pic.twitter.com/rGQIEuhE3B
— Will Henderson (@willh94) March 13, 2017
Asuka is currently on an NXT unbeaten streak that could surprass Goldberg’s infamous 173-0 set in the late 90s. If Asuka does happen to lose her first match and championship to Ember Moon at TakeOver, one night before WrestleMania, the rumor of her addition to the main roster could come true at WrestleMania.
Whether Asuka makes the jump or not, definitely look for a surprise entrant in Alexa’s ‘Mania challenge.
As for the rest of WrestleMania 33, you can find the fully announced card below.
United States Champion Chris Jericho vs Kevin Owens
RAW’s Women’s Champion Bayley vs Charlotte Flair vs Sasha Banks
Universal Champion Goldberg Vs Brock Lesnar
WWE Champion Bray Wyatt vs Randy Orton
Smackdown Women’s Champion Alexa Bliss Against All Smackdown Women
2017 Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal
Rumored Matches include: John Cena and Nikki Bella Tag Match against The Miz and Maryse, The Big Show vs Shaq, Shane McMahon vs AJ Styles, and Triple H vs Seth Rollins.
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