Interim NXT Cruiserweight Championship Tournament: Format and Rules explained

The spread of the COVID-19 pandemic has put the sporting world in a spot of bother. A lot of events have been forced to be postponed or canceled. While WWE was able to strive forward and deliver us a memorable WrestleMania 36 weekend, there were a few storylines that got affected by the current global conditions.

The NXT Tag Team title picture and the dream bout between Finn Balor and WALTER are now in some serious limbo. However, the one that was most affected was the NXT Cruiserweight Championship as the current titleholder, Jordan Devlin, is stuck in the UK and cannot travel at the moment into the US.

This has forced the hand of the management and it was announced by NXT GM, William Regal, that a tournament will be conducted to determine an interim Champion as the Irish Ace will not be able to defend his title.

WWE has released the rules and the format of the tournament on the website. And, it is safe to say that the management has taken an interesting approach when it comes to the Interim NXT Cruiserweight Championship Tournament.

The rules and the format are as follows:

-Eight Superstars will be split into two groups of four.

-Superstars will compete against each of the three other members of their group.

-The Superstar with the best record in each group will advance to the championship match.

-Any ties will be broken by head-to-head record.

-The winner of Group A will face the winner of Group B to determine the new Interim NXT Cruiserweight Champion.

Tournaments of this sort that are conducted by WWE and NXT have all been with a knockout format. This means that the Superstars/teams that lost the match will be eliminated and would not get another chance at redemption. This was recently seen with the Dusty Rhodes Tag team Classic tournament which was won by The BroserWeights.

The tournament, which starts this Wednesday on NXT, will use the Round-Robin format which we usually see in football leagues around the globe. Each participant will have to face the others in the group and each win will carry a certain amount of points. In case of a double count-out or when the matches finished without a result, the points will be shared by the two Superstars.

After all the Superstars have faced each other in their respective groups, the final points will be looked at and the person with the best record qualifies. Things will get interesting if two Superstars have the same number of points. Then the head to head record between the two will be seen and then the best man will progress to the Championship round. Given that NXT does have the habit of giving us a few swerves during the tournament, we can expect some tie-breakers as well.

The format currently adopted for the Interim NXT Cruiserweight Champion Tournament does offer a lot of excitement for the fans. The names of the eight Superstars who will be competing in the tournament will be announced shorty. And, it seems as though wwill be able to witness many dream bouts featuring the likes of Kushida, Isaiah 'Swerve' Scott, Tony Nese, and Lio Rush.

Swerve and The Time Splitter have been teasing a feud for some time so don't be surprised to see these two make it to the final.

You know what comes next @KUSHIDA_0904 pic.twitter.com/diQ4PkXy89
— Isaiah Swerve Scott (@swerveconfident) April 2, 2020

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Former Champion Lio Rush took to Twitter today and seemed confident that he will become a two-time Cruiserweight Champion.

There is no secret!⏳@WWE @WWEonFOX @WWENXT #NXT #Lio #LioRush #Champion pic.twitter.com/oiP73SPFt3
— Lio (@itsLioRush) April 12, 2020

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Tony Nese and Jack Gallagher are also carrying some momentum into the tournament and could deliver a hard-hitting matchup if they are in the same group.