Drew McIntyre vs. Goldberg opening WWE Royal Rumble
This story was updated at 6 PM Eastern.
The match order of Sunday’s WWE Royal Rumble card is taking shape as WWE Champion Drew McIntyre vs. Goldberg is set to open tonight’s pay-per-view, announced by WWE on the pre-show.
The story was reported earlier in the day by Fightful and PWInsider.
Additionally, PWInsider and Fightful reported that the men’s Rumble will close the show, later confirmed by Dave Meltzer. This follows the news that the Women’s Tag Team Title match will take place on the pre-show as Charlotte Flair and Asuka will defend their titles against Nia Jax & Shayna Baszler.
That would leave the women’s Rumble, Universal Champion Roman Reigns vs. Kevin Owens in a last man standing match, and SmackDown women’s champion Sasha Banks vs. Carmella for the rest of the main card.
This will be Goldberg’s first WWE match since losing the Universal title last March to Braun Strowman at WrestleMania and his fifth match overall since 2019. McIntyre returned to action at last week’s Superstar Spectacle after a brief absence due to COVID-19. Before that, he successfully defended his title against Keith Lee on the January 4th Raw.