Kevin Owens challenging Roman Reigns for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship at the Royal Rumble is official.
During Friday night’s episode of SmackDown, it was confirmed that Owens will challenge for title at the Royal Rumble on Saturday, January 28 at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas.
Friday night’s SmackDown opened up Friday night with The Bloodline taking over the show. Reigns claimed he did not lose last week in the tag team match with he and Zayn taking on John Cena and Kevin Owens – but it was Zayn who lost. Reigns was unhappy with Zayn for calling his shot and failing to come through. Reigns then went on to accuse Zayn of wanting to be the Tribal Chief.
Below is an excerpt from Roy Nemer’s SmackDown recap of how it all went down
Roman yells at Zayn and asks him if he wants to be the tribal chief, if he wants to run the Bloodline. Zayn backs away as he gets scared and Kevin’s music hits and out comes Kevin Owens.
He says before things go too far, he thinks Roman needs to calm down. Because he has some misdirected anger. He is always calm, cool, collected. The last time he saw him like this, Kevin was the cause of this. And he thinks tonight, he is the cause of it. His problem is not Zayn. Roman’s problem is Kevin. Zayn has said it for weeks, he has a KO problem. And it’s time for Roman to show everyone what the tribal chief does. He doesn’t want to tell him what to do but the best way to take care of the KO problem is in a match at the Royal Rumble for the Undisputed WWE championship.
Roman says yeah, sure, he doesn’t care. He wants Owens to leave forever. Owens tells him after what they did to him last week, when Kevin beat Roman, he is in a great mood. He will leave but not forever. He will see him at the Royal Rumble. He tells Zayn he will see him when he digs his balls out of Roman’s pocket.