Backstage News On A Major Potential WrestleMania 34 Match

It was reported earlier this week that the main event for the SmackDown LIVE-exclusive pay-per-view WWE Fastlane will be AJ Styles defending the WWE Championship in a Fatal 5-Way Match against Randy Orton, Shinsuke Nakamura, Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn. This seems to suggest that Orton, Nakamura, Owens, and Zayn aren’t winning the Royal Rumble Match since it wouldn’t make sense for them to get a shot at the WWE Championship at Fastlane and then again at WrestleMania.

There had been speculation that Styles would be defending his WWE Championship against John Cena at WrestleMania 34, with the storyline being that Cena would be trying to break Ric Flair’s recognized record of 16 World Championship reigns. According to Dave Meltzer in the latest edition of The Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Cena will not be facing Styles at WrestleMania since Cena “is in a much bigger match than Styles.”

He added that while he doesn’t know exactly who Cena will be facing, he was told that the match will be clear within a few weeks.

The only names that Meltzer could come up with on facing Cena are The Undertaker, Batista, Goldberg or Hulk Hogan. In the case of Hogan, it would be a major surprise given his controversy with his leaked racist rant, as well as lingering issues with his back.

Meltzer expects that the top WrestleMania matches will be known at the 25th anniversary of Raw on Monday, January 22, 2018. The special will emanate from both the Barclays Center and the Manhattan Center in New York City and will feature appearances by The Undertaker, Kevin Nash, and Shawn Michaels, among others.