AJ Styles retains WWE world championship, will wrestle John Cena at Royal Rumble

WWE closed out tonight’s (Dec. 27, 2016) episode of SmackDown Live in Chicago with a WWE world championship match pitting titleholder AJ Styles against both Dolph Ziggler and Baron Corbin. The winner, as announced earlier in the evening, would go on to face John Cena at Royal Rumble next month.

It was your standard triple threat match until late, when Baron Corbin was set up on a table on the outside and Ziggler and Styles both took a leap off the barricade to put him through it.

Ziggler put up a hell of a fight after this but ultimately it was Styles, of course, who came away victorious. He did so by taking advantage of Corbin hitting Ziggler with a Deep Six, knocking him out of the ring and pinning Dolph after.

That led to Cena running out to confront AJ. He simply extended his hand and, after taking his time laying out the title in front of him, Styles shook it.

It’s on.

For complete SmackDown Live results and coverage click here.