Rusev Earns First WWE Championship Opportunity Against AJ Styles At Extreme Rules

AJ Styles will be defending his WWE Championship against Rusev.

Tonight on Smackdown, nearly the whole last hour of the program was a six person gauntlet match to determine the number one contender to AJ Styles’ WWE Championship. The match consisted of Big E, Daniel Bryan, Samoa Joe, the Miz, and Rusev who came out on top. 

Rusev was the last entrant in the match and beat the Miz who was the entrant before him. The following is an excerpt from the live coverage provided by Fightful’s Ryan Cook.

Rusev fights out of a headlock before Miz hits a neckbreaker for a quick two count, then Miz hits a running clothesline into a diving double ax handle for another quick two count. Rusev comes back with a wheel kick before they counter each other’s finishers until Rusev hits the Machka Kick for a near fall. Miz does his version of the Yes Kicks before Rusev goes for the Accolade and Miz hits a snap DDT for a near fall. Rusev then hits another Machka Kick before locking in the Accolade for the tap and the win.

AJ Styles came to the ring after the match for a stare down with Rusev and ended up taking out Aiden English. Their match will happen at Extreme Rules on July 15th.

Rusev has been on the main roster of WWE since 2014 and has held the United States Championship twice but Extreme Rules will be the first time Rusev has contested the WWE Championship on WWE programming.

Fightful Wrestling has live coverage each week for Smackdown and a recapping podcast. The same will be available for Extreme Rules.