WWE title match, Goldberg vs. Lashley booked for Crown Jewel

WWE has said the new rosters for Monday Night Raw and Friday Night SmackDown won’t go into effect until Oct. 22, just one night after the Crown Jewel event set for Thurs., Oct. 21, 2021, in Saudi Arabia. Despite that, wrestlers from both brands have been showing up on both Draft shows, just doing as they please.

Here’s one that makes sense: WWE Champion Big E, drafted to Raw, cut a promo on Drew McIntyre, who made clear he wanted to challenge for that title before he was drafted to SmackDown. This week, they got together again to settle up on the beef they started last week.

Somehow, they detoured into a tag team match, where they linked up to defeat The Dirty Dawgs, Dolph Ziggler and Big Bob. That built some kind of bond of respect between them and E accepted McIntyre’s challenge while letting him know he’d see him at Crown Jewel.

Elsewhere, Goldberg did indeed make his return to Raw this week. He was there to call out Lashley, who agreed to face the legend at the upcoming Saudi show only if he agreed to a No Holds Barred stipulation. That happened, of course, and now it’s official.

The updated match card:

• Roman Reigns (c) vs. Brock Lesnar (Universal championship)
• Big E (c) vs. Drew McIntyre (WWE championship)
• Becky Lynch (c) vs. Bianca Belair vs. Sasha Banks (SmackDown women’s championship)
• RK-Bro (c) vs. AJ Styles & Omos (Raw tag team championship)
• Goldberg vs. Bobby Lashley (No Holds Barred)