The WWE will head back to Saudi Arabia this weekend with Night of Champions coming live from the Jeddah Super Dome in Jeddah, SA. The show will take place on Saturday, May 27 at 1 p.m. ET and will be streamed on Peacock.
NOC is the second of three straight premium live events the company is holding outside of the continental United States this summer. If you haven’t paid attention to Monday Night Raw or Friday Night Smackdown over the last few weeks, we’ll get you caught up with how these matches came to be below.
Night of Champions key stories
World Heavyweight Championship Tournament final
The presumed main event of the show will feature Seth Rollins facing AJ Styles for the new World Heavyweight Championship. Triple H introduced the new world title belt last month out of necessity, considering that undisputed WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns doesn’t defend his belts very often. He announced a tournament for the new title to be held, with the finals taking place at NOC. Rollins was able to emerge from the Raw side of the bracket while Styles was able to do the same on the Smackdown side.
With Reigns still standing atop Smackdown, the winner of the new belt will be the top champion of Raw moving forward. We’ll see which one of these decorated veterans can add the WHC to their already long list of accomplishments in the WWE.
KO/Zayn vs. Reigns/Sikoa
Another marquee match will feature Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn defend the undisputed WWE Tag Team Championships against Roman Reigns and Solo Sikoa. Since winning the belts from the Usos at Wrestlemania, KO and Sami have continued their war against the Bloodline and successfully retained against the Usos on a recent episode of Smackdown. Frustrated at his cousins not being able to get the job done, Reigns recently returned from a month-long hiatus to declare that he and Sikoa would bring the belts back to the group.
The under current of all of this is the Usos’ continued descent since Wrestlemania, as they’ve been shamed and ostracized by Reigns for their recent failures. We’ll see if the brothers play a role in this matchup and if the rift in the Bloodline continues.
Brock Lesnar vs. Cody Rhodes
The feud between Brock Lesnar and Cody Rhodes stems back to the Raw after Wrestlemania where the former attacked the latter in the main event. They clashed earlier in the month at Backlash, where Rhodes bloodied Lesnar’s face and won the match. The following night, the “Beast” cost the “American Nightmare” a shot at the World Heavyweight Championship and challenge him to a fight at Night of Champions.
In the weeks since, Lesnar has continued his assaults on Rhodes and even broke his arm. Despite his condition, Cody will still take part in the match, similar to what he did one year ago against Seth Rollins in Hell in a Cell. We’ll see if Rhodes can survive this fight.
Other matches
- Raw Women’s Champion Bianca Belair will defend her title against Asuka in a rematch of their bout at Wrestlemania. This stems from a recent episode of Smackdown where Belair was holding a celebration for being the longest reigning women’s champion of the modern era, only for Asuka to interrupt and spray her with the blue mist.
- Becky Lynch will go one-on-one with Trish Stratus in the first encounter of their feud. Stratus cost Lynch and Lita the WWE Women’s Tag Team Championship in April and attacked Lynch after the match. She the next few weeks running down “The Man” on the mic, only for Lynch to come back and return the favor. A match for Night of Champions was made official and the two solidified it with a contract signing on Raw this past Monday.
Full list of matches*
World Heavyweight Championship – AJ Styles vs. Seth Rollins
Raw Women’s Championship – Bianca Belair (c) vs. Asuka
Smackdown Women’s Championship – Rhea Ripley (c) vs. Natalya
Undisputed WWE Tag Team Championship – Kevin Owens/Sami Zayn (c) vs. Roman Reigns/Solo Sikoa
Intercontinental Championship – Gunther (c) vs. Mustafa Ali
Brock Lesnar vs. Cody Rhodes
Becky Lynch vs. Trish Stratus
*Card subject to change