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Bayley and Sasha Banks' WWE careers have been intertwined since their time in NXT. Over the years, they have been both friends and foes on-screen in WWE but they have been close friends behind the scenes for years. In a recent appearance on The New Day's podcast, Bayley opened up about her friendship with Sasha Banks and how long it took for them to become close personal friends.
Bayley opens up about her friendship with Sasha Banks
Former SmackDown Women's Champion Bayley was recently a guest on The New Day's Feel The Power podcast. During her appearance on Feel The Power, Bayley was asked about her friendship with Sasha Banks. Bayley said that the two of them didn't click as friends instantly but the ended up becoming friends over time. Bayley also spoke about her first match against Sasha Banks in FCW, where the two of them wrestled in front of coaches in an empty arena:
Well actually, as far as our personal friendship, that took longer than anything because we're such different people. When we first had our match, FCW literally threw us in the ring but they gave us five minutes. It was in front of all the coaches, and luckily, none of my peers were here yet. It was just the empty arena but with coaches.
We say this story all the time - it was literally five minutes on the fly to have a match and it was with her. I think that was the best match I ever had. I was on the indies for four-and-a-half years, but I'm pretty sure that was the best match I ever had, and I just couldn't believe we pulled it off in five minutes. I was like, 'Man, she's going to help me get better.' I can friggin' wrestle this girl! She was never out of place. A lot of the girls I worked with, not in a bad way, but I felt like I was better than them already. So I'm like, 'This girl is awesome! She's someone I can push myself with.' But in the ring, we always feel like that.
We were working matches all the time, whether it was in tag matches or against each other. We had a million dark matches in NXT before we started getting on TV. It took a while for us to realize that we could be friends. I think we were both standoffish with each other - it was weird. I think she didn't want to be my friend or she already had friends there, because she was there before me. H/T: WrestlingINC
Speaking about how she and Sasha Banks became friends, Bayley said that their friendship began after they learned that they had grown up with similar interests:
Once we started learning that we're both dorks who loved wrestling since we were 10 years old, and the way we grew up together, that's when it started being, 'Alright, she's kind of cool.' We kind of found our characters at the same time, so that was very helpful. When we had promos, we could use each other. We can be in each other's promos and help find each other, so, I'm so lucky. I couldn't have done that whole pandemic without anybody else. H/T: WrestlingINC
Bayley was a part of the SmackDown Women's team at Survivor Series. She was the first one to be eliminated from the match, being taken out by Peyton Royce. The SmackDown women ended up losing the match with Lana being the sole survivor for Team RAW.
It looks like we could see Bayley moving on to a feud with Bianca Belair next. Bayley was on commentary for Belair's match against Natalya on SmackDown. Bayley got involved at one point and inadvertently ended up costing Natalya the match.
You can listen The New Day's Feel The Power podcast HERE.
