Possible Reason Why WWE Booked A Flag Match at WWE Battleground

As seen on Tuesday’s episode of SmackDown Live, WWE announced that John Cena would face Rusev in a flag match at the upcoming WWE Battleground event. Bryan Alvarez speculated on today’s installment of Wrestling Observer Live that the reason WWE decided to have a flag match between the two was in case they decide to have Rusev win.

“The Flag match is essentially the professional wrestling version of capture the flag. For the match two flags are placed on opposite turnbuckles, each representing a specific wrestler or team of wrestlers, and the object of the match is to retrieve the opponent’s flag and raise it while defending the flag in the wrestler’s corner.”

According to the rules (seen above), the match will conclude when a specific wrestler retrieves the flag of their opponent. This means Cena doesn’t have to actually be pinned to lose the match. Historically, WWE normally has gimmick matches as a blow-off match in a feud or as an “out” for a screwy finish.

Seth Rollins Appears at SmackDown Event & Challenges Jinder Mahal

Seth Rollins made an appearance at Saturday’s WWE Live Event and challenged Jinder Mahal for the WWE Championship. The incident went down while Jinder Mahal was cutting an in-ring promo and Rollins made his surprise appearance and cut a promo as well. This led to a match between the two. The match ended in disqualification when the Singh brothers interfered.

You can check out footage below:

Originally Shinsuke Nakamura was scheduled to face Mahal at the event, however Rollins’ filled in as the replacement.

Jim Cornette Challenges Vince Russo to Face-to-Face Meeting

The following audio clip of Jim Cornette challenging former WWE writer Vince Russo to a face-to-face meeting was published to his Talking Sense YouTube channel. For those not keeping track, the two have been bad mouthing each other on their podcasts ever since the “Table for 3” episode aired on the WWE Network that saw both Eric Bischoff and Cornette making remarks about Russo.

“Here it is finally! Jim Cornette issues a challenge to meet up with Vince Russo at a time and place of his choosing, away from police, an audience and public announcement, for a final showdown between the two bitter enemies. THAT is how to cut a promo!”