There has been a change to the main event of the 2021 Royal Rumble on January 31, which will now see Kevin Owens replace Adam Pearce as the challenger of Roman Reigns.
During the January 15 Friday Night SmackDown, ‘The Tribal Chief’ and his Special Counsel had been using every trick in the book to get Pearce to sign the contract for their WWE Universal Championship Match at the elimination spectacular after tricking him into the Rumble headliner seven days previous.
However, things didn’t go the way of Roman Reigns when the authority figure appeared for their in-ring contract signing. Deemed a Last Man Standing Match in order that ‘The Head of the Table’ would teach the former NWA World Heavyweight Champion a lesson, Pearce watched as the champion signed the contract before leaving the ring.
On his exit, Pearce feigned an injury to his leg and then gleefully stated that should Roman have read the contract properly then he would have seen the existence of a clause that stated should he become injured prior to January 31, then he would be in his rights to find a suitable replacement.
With that, Pearce then introduced a returning Kevin Owens who raged to the ring following the ambush several weeks ago when Reigns and Jey Uso pitched him from the ThunderDome set.
The contract has now been signed and Roman Reigns will defend the WWE Universal Championship against Kevin Owens in a Last Man Standing Match at the Royal Rumble, in the continuation of a tale that has been expertly told.