Several competitors in the WWE's United Kingdom Championship tournament are on their way to San Antonio this weekend.
According to the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, WWE is bringing in several wrestlers from the tournament. The promotion pulled Tyler Bate, the winner of the tournament and current WWE UK Champion, from his booking for the wXw promotion in Germany this weekend. WWE also pulled Pete Dunne, the runner-up in its tournament, and Trent Seven from the wXw event.
Speculation is that Bate, Dunne, Seven, Mark Andrews, and Wolfgang all were being brought in to San Antonio by the company for the events in San Antonio. Their exact roles, however, remained undefined. They may be part of the Royal Rumble match itself this Sunday, or merely introduced as part of the Rumble broadcast, or be involved in some capacity as part of the NXT Takeover event taking place this Saturday.
This is not the first time WWE has pulled talents who appeared in the UK tournament from scheduled bookings for other promotions. Last weekend, WWE removed Dunne and Joseph Conners from their scheduled matches at the IPW:UK internet pay-per-view, which was held last Sunday, January 22. They were shifted to dark matches instead.
The WWE held its UK championship tournament January 13-14 in Blackpool. The tourney happened a few months after WWE offered contracts with unique language to several talents based in the UK. Those contracts had unique language that would allow signees to continue to work for other promotions in the United Kingdom, as long as those dates were approved by WWE.
Remember, Fightful.com will have live viewing parties for both NXT Takeover on Saturday and the Royal Rumble on Sunday, as well as post-show podcasts.
