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This week’s episode of WWE Raw will be remembered for the historic announcement from Stephanie McMahon that there will be a women’s Royal Rumble match for the first time in 2018.
The rest of the show was good, if not spectacular, and largely centred around the storyline involving Samoa Joe, Seth Rollins and Jason Jordan.
We also saw a Superstar appear on Raw for the very first time, while the latest chapter in “The Great War” between Matt Hardy and Bray Wyatt took a somewhat fishy twist.
In this article, we look at five ‘OMG’ moments from the episode.
#5 Scott Dawson & Dash Wilder return
One surprise moment on this week’s Raw saw The Revival compete in their first match as a duo in almost five months.
Since their main-roster call-up in April, Dash Wilder missed two months of action with a jaw injury while Scott Dawson was ruled out for four months after bicep surgery.
Both men have now fully recovered from their injuries and they made their earlier-than-expected return to Raw when they faced Heath Slater & Rhyno on this week’s episode.
As you’d expect, the two men who live by the in-ring motto “No Flips, Just Fists” made light work of their opponents and got the victory after hitting a Shatter Machine on Slater.
#4 Hideo Itami debuts on Raw & aligns with Finn Balor
Three-and-a-half years on from signing with WWE, Hideo Itami has finally been called up to the main roster and he made his surprise Raw debut on Monday night’s episode.
Having already been advertised for 205 Live this week, we all expected to see the Japanese sensation debut on Tuesday, but he turned up on Monday instead to help former NXT ally Finn Balor defeat Curtis Axel and Bo Dallas.
Hideo’s time in NXT was hampered with injuries but, providing he stays healthy, it’s safe to say he’ll have happier days in the cruiserweight division.
Once Cedric Alexander has faced Enzo Amore for the Cruiserweight Championship, expect Itami to immediately enter into a storyline with whoever is holding the title.
#3 Ferdinand > Lesnar
When you’re graced with the presence of Brock Lesnar, you better make sure you don’t make the reigning, defending, undisputed Universal champion angry.
One fan thought they’d take a risk anyway on this week’s Raw when they held up a ‘Ferdinand > Lesnar’ sign in the front row during the opening segment between Kurt Angle, Braun Strowman, Kane, Paul Heyman and Brock.
Ferdinand is an animated bull character, voiced by John Cena in a recently released movie, who prefers to lie under trees and smell flowers rather than butt heads with his fellow bulls. In other words, he’s the polar opposite of “The Beast”.
It wasn’t clear if Lesnar actually saw the sign because the fan had the intelligence to take it down when the Universal champion walked directly past him. If he saw it, however, things could have got interesting!
#2 "Woken" Matt Hardy plays chess with a goldfish
It’s difficult to decipher the cryptic and chaotic words spoken by “Woken” Matt Hardy at the best of times, never mind when he’s having a one-way conversation with a goldfish called Napoleon.
On this week’s episode of Raw, Hardy defeated said goldfish in a game of chess and warned Bray Wyatt that, like with the board game, one wrong move inside a WWE ring can lead to “total and utter annihilation”.
“Now that the new battlefield has been set, I will stand side by side with all of my Woken Warriors, but The Great War against Bray Wyatt and his evil highness Queen Sister Abigail must be stopped,” continued Hardy.
Whatever crazy antics Hardy gets up to next, it’s sure to be WONDERFUL. YEEAAAASSSSSS.
#1 Stephanie McMahon announces a women’s Royal Rumble
You don’t get much more ‘OMG’ than Stephanie McMahon returning to Raw to announce that 2018 will be the first year in WWE history that there will be an all women’s Royal Rumble match.
This week’s Raw was main-evented by the six-woman tag match between Absolution and Sasha Banks, Bayley and Mickie James, which ended in a disqualification and resulted in every woman from the red brand’s roster battling it out with one another.
That’s when Stephanie’s music hit. The Raw Commissioner made her way down to the ring, praised every person involved in the Divas Revolution and the Women’s Evolution, and revealed that there will be a female Rumble on the 28 January for the first time.
A women’s match at the event has been rumoured for a while but it was more in hope than expectation that it would actually happen, so the news comes as a welcome surprise to all WWE fans.
Roll on the Rumble!
