Bengaluru, August 16: Just five nights away from a WrestleMania-caliber SummerSlam 2021, WWE Monday Night Raw will present the go-home episode for the PPV gathering all the final storyline build ups.
Legendary Goldberg is confirmed to make an appearance during the potential main event segment as he'll confront the WWE Champion, while a couple of matches have been announced for the night
First up, Randy Orton faces one-half of the Raw Tag Team Champions followed by a handicap match featuring former champion Drew McIntyre in the show that emanates from the AT&T Center in San Antonio, Texas.
MVP and the WWE Champion Bobby Lashley are very clear with their message to Bill Goldberg's son Gage Goldberg (who's been inserted into the ongoing WWE Title match feud), who has been advised that he should not watch what happens to his father at SummerSlam 2021.
Lashley sent a straight-up warning to his opponent saying that this Sunday night, "Goldberg isn't next, he’s done!"
The Hall of Famer has now been confirmed to meet Bobby Lashley face-to-face one last time before their big SummerSlam match. Given the intensity of the ongoing feud, all hell might break loose when these two are in the same building.
Last week, Randy Orton returned to Raw and denied his former tag partner Riddle’s request to resume their team RK-Bro. Orton later defeated RAW Tag Team Champion AJ Styles in the main event with an RKO after Riddle offered help to him by dealing with Omos at ringside.
The post-match segment saw Orton finally hugging Riddle which the crowd gave a loud pop. But then as the duo were celebrating, Orton raised Riddle’s arm in the air only to lay him out, in the ring with the "three-most destructive letters in the history of sports entertainment" - a RKO.
TOMORROW NIGHT on #WWERaw@RandyOrton goes one-on-one with @TheGiantOmos for the first time ever!
— WWE (@WWE) August 15, 2021
📺 8/7c @USA_Network pic.twitter.com/JrbU1GHnTa
This week, Randy Orton will face the other half of the RAW Tag Team Champions, Omos in singles action. The belief is that despite Orton delivering an RKO to Riddle, team RK-Bro will eventually get on the same page and challenge Omos and AJ Styles for the tag titles at SummerSlam.
TOMORROW NIGHT on #WWERaw@DMcIntyreWWE has the titanic task of battling Veer & Shanky in a 2-on-1 #HandicapMatch with HUGE #SummerSlam implications!https://t.co/920QKNFpAA pic.twitter.com/RIFGEMqSql
— WWE (@WWE) August 15, 2021
A 2-on-1 Handicap Match has also been announced for RAW where Drew McIntyre will compete against Veer and Shanky. This will help to build up the scheduled McIntyre vs. Jinder Mahal matchup for SummerSlam, which was confirmed this past Friday night just before SmackDown on FOX aired.
The upcoming Handicap Match will actually be a rematch from the August 2 RAW episode, which saw McIntyre get a win via disqualification after Jinder Mahal interfered and attacked his former 3MB partner with a chair.
Mahal even hired Baron Corbin to hurt McIntyre in a match, last week but the former King of the Ring winner failed to get the job done.
Fresh-off her huge victory against Charlotte Flair in a No Holds Barred Match, Raw Women’s Champion Nikki Cross A.S.H. hoped to secure another huge win against her other SummerSlam opponent, Rhea Ripley. But the back-and-forth bout had a DQ-end, instead, after Charlotte Flair intervened it.
The Queen unleashed a vicious attack on both the competitors and then raised the Raw Women’s Championship high above her head, hinting at her 12th Women’s Championship reign. Can the champion and Ripley make a comeback and fire back at Flair? We'll find out on this final edition of Raw before SummerSlam 2021.