After an enormous build-up, WWE Royal Rumble 2025 is finished and dusted, and it did not disappoint.
From begin to end, a sell-out crowd in Indianapolis had been handled to a high-quality night time of wrestling leisure as a brand new stretch of feuds, rivalries and battles had been pieced collectively.
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Charlotte Aptitude and Jey Uso had been the night time’s greatest winners as they received the ladies and men’s Rumble matches, whereas Cody Rhodes overcame Kevin Owens in a crunching ladder match to retain his Undisputed WWE Championship.
A lot was crammed into the Rumble that, as ever, lots can get misplaced within the shuffle so, to help, listed below are 5 of talkSPORT’s key takeaways from WWE’s Royal Rumble 2025:
In case you did not know, WWE is large
Watching WWE Royal Rumble 2025 on Netflix actually hammered house simply how large a place the corporate is in proper now. It might sound glib, but it surely has been strengthened massively because the flip of the 12 months and the $5bn deal that is taken a lot of WWE on to Netflix.
The corporate rightly boasted that Saturday night time’s Royal Rumble was the most important within the occasion’s storied historical past – over 70,000 packed into Lucas Oil Stadium for the present itself, whereas undoubted thousands and thousands may have tuned in by way of the streaming service. Add that to a string of sell-out exhibits, worldwide excursions and merchandise gross sales, the excitement – and revenues – are rising at phenomenal pace.
We’re now into WrestleMania season, formally, and you’ll solely think about WWE getting larger and higher rom right here.
WWE nonetheless does tag groups
WWE has been on fairly the roll underneath the stewardship of Paul ‘Triple H’ Levesque during the last couple of years however, if one criticism could be levied his manner, it would simply be a scarcity of deal with the tag crew divisions.
Whereas singles titles have been plotted rigorously in storylines, tag gold has been extra of a scorching potato, altering fingers quite a few occasions throughout the final months with no entity actually capable of stake a declare with a protracted tenure.
The tag crew title match at Royal Rumble was, admittedly, extra of a filler deal with between the ladies’s Rumble and the Owens-Rhodes ladder match, but it surely was extraordinarily watchable as Motor Metropolis Machine Weapons battled WWE stalwarts DIY.
Levesque ran a good and gifted tag crew bunch whereas in command of NXT, so why the distinction at ‘foremost roster’ stage? There are groups at his disposal – not least the Avenue Income who featured on the bout’s climax – so it is time to use them.
Are we at New Day and Usos stage proper now? You’d say not, however there’s just one option to get again there.
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Does Cody Rhodes want some downtime?
This will likely appear an unthinkable notion given, a 12 months in the past, Cody Rhodes triumphed at Royal Rumble and earlier than downing Roman Reigns at WrestleMania to the fun of just about everybody. He is been on prime ever since, however is it time for change?
WWE does nothing for nothing, and wastes little or no. Why, then, have so a lot of Rhodes’ rivals made some extent heading into Saturday’s present that the burden of the Undisputed WWE title is trying like an excessive amount of to hold for the American Nightmare?
Cody himself has even lacked a few of his regular lustre and, all through the match towards Kevin Owens, commentators rammed house the narrative about all of it getting a bit an excessive amount of.
The son of a son of a plumber received the job completed towards KO in a hard-hitting affair, however might he profit from a break? It is onerous to say Rhodes’ recognition is starting to wane, however one thing feels prefer it may very well be shifting in his momentum, and the group response to his victory appeared flat.
Does he merely want a break earlier than Mania, or is greater change afoot? Time will inform.
Mid-card titles would possibly simply be a factor
Neither the Ladies’s Intercontinental title nor the US Championship had been defended at Royal Rumble – or the lads’s for that matter – however the girls’s Rumble match, as an illustration, did an excellent job of shining a lightweight on them and furthering the feuds round them.
Ivy Nile seems set to problem Lyra Valkyria for the IC gold, not least after she dumped her out of the Rumble, and Chelsea Inexperienced, too, received a powerful exhibiting – her elimination by the hands of pal Piper Niven one of many standout moments.
Pure Fusion Collective briefly dominated the match, too, regardless of none of its quantity being an incumbent champion, and new signee Jordynne Grace received a thunderous response on her debut. Maybe, in the end, mid-card titles, notably within the girls’s roster, is doing the job of telling tales past who’s the girls’s champion in WWE. The depth of expertise goes past World Champ Rhea Ripley and WWE Champ Tiffany Stratton, and the Rumble did a nice job of exhibiting it.
Let’s stay awake on Liv Morgan in 2025
Charlotte Aptitude made her a lot anticipated return at Royal Rumble and, understandably given their standing, Rhea Ripley and Tiffany Stratton dominate the ladies’s rosters in WWE as the best profile feminine champions, now ably supported by a powerful undercard, as famous above.
Michael Cole made the purpose on commentary at Royal Rumble, although: the feminine celebrity of the 12 months in 2024 actually was Liv Morgan. After Ripley was left on the shelf by means of harm, Morgan stepped up as Ladies’s World Champion for months and, alongside Dominik Mysterio and Judgement Day, was integral in one of many greatest WWE storylines of the 12 months.
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Having been in each Rumble match to-date, she started Saturday’s Rumble match alongside Iyo Sky and went nearly the total period, as if to underline the belief the corporate nonetheless has in her, regardless of opting to modify again to Ripley the place the title is anxious. 2025 may very well be one other large one for Liv. This is hoping.