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What's the story?
The Extreme Rules 2019 match card underwent a major change this week as the WWE SmackDown Women's Championship match was announced to be a 2-on-1 handicap bout featuring the team of Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross against the titleholder Bayley.
On the latest edition of the Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer revealed the real reason behind the alteration. As reported by Meltzer, Alexa Bliss is currently suffering from a really bad sinus infection and thus, the Extreme Rules match had to be changed in order to protect the 5-time Women's Champion.
In case you didn't know...
You'd know about Bliss' recent health struggles if you have been religiously following her Twitter handle. On the go-home episode of Raw, Nikki Cross beat Bayley in a Beat the Clock Challenge to determine the stipulation for the original Bliss vs. Bayley Extreme Rules match.
Cross requested for the match to be converted to a handicap match, with Bliss and herself possibly becoming co-champions if they manage to beat The Hugger.
The speculation going around was that the change was made to accommodate the return of Sasha Banks, however, that may not be the case.
The heart of the matter
Meltzer said that Cross was added to the title match with the sole intention of protecting a sick Alexa Bliss. He explained:
"So Alexa Bliss has a really bad sinus infection. Originally they were not going to do the handicap match. The handicap match was a late change and everything that happened on TV this Monday and Tuesday with no Alexa Bliss was because of her sinus infection and they rewrote the whole storyline. They may have done Alexa Bliss-Bayley beat the clock challenge but the reason that made no sense, as the end result was Alexa Bliss' condition and they were going to do a handicap match to protect Alexa.
So in doing that they had to come up with a reason and then you had this beat the clock thing, and Nikki Cross had to win and then even though Nikki Cross is a babyface, she had to ask for a handicap match. It's one of those things where I remember watching on TV and it makes no sense. Nikki Cross is supposed to be a babyface and now she's asking for a match which is inherently unfair. But that's the reason for it, they just felt that due to the situation, they needed to do this and this was the idea they came up to get to that destination."
What's next?
It all makes sense now, doesn't it? Extreme Rules will take place this coming Sunday at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
What are your predictions for the SmackDown Women's title match? Will Cross and Bliss become co-champions? Will Sasha Banks make her much-anticipated return to aid the Hugger? Sound off in the comments section below.
Note: If you use the quotes from this news piece, make sure to credit Sportskeeda at the end of your article, with a link to this piece.
