SmackDown Women's Championship Match Set for Extreme Rules 2021

The latest edition of SmackDown saw, among other things, the very first match officially announced for the 13th annual Extreme Rules event. It is a rematch from SummerSlam, as Becky Lynch will defend the SmackDown Women's Championship against former champion Bianca Belair. So what led to this?

At SummerSlam, Bianca was set to compete in another rematch, this one being from Night 1 of this year's WrestleMania. The EST of WWE was set to face off against an evil and immensely vengeful Sasha Banks, who returned weeks prior and appeared to help Bianca against Carmella and Zelina Vega, only to attack her from behind out of spite for what occurred at WrestleMania. The final days entering SummerSlam saw the match in jeopardy due to Sasha's sudden absence, yet it was still being promoted. However, on the night of the event, Sasha was officially announced as being unable to appear at the event, and regarding a replacement, Carmella was originally set to fill in as Bianca's opponent.

At that moment, fans and viewers heard the familiar music of Becky Lynch, who was making her return from maternity leave, and she fought off Carmella and tossed her out of the ring. She later gave a non-verbal challenge to Bianca for the title, with Bianca accepting and shaking hands with Becky before she was suddenly decked by The Man herself. 26 seconds later, Becky captured her fourth SmackDown Women's Championship, and fifth title overall.

Fans were also hit with this added news: Becky Lynch turned heel due to the cheap shot and quick title win, and she would be portrayed as SmackDown's lead villainess from this point on. Becky has been a heel twice before in WWE, once in NXT and once before on SmackDown. The NXT run was, IMO, underwhelming, and Becky's heel turn from SummerSlam in 2018 was a massive failure. On that night, Becky viciously attacked Charlotte Flair after she defeated her and Carmella to win the SmackDown Women's Championship, but that was met with immense cheers that would follow every time she went after Charlotte, mainly due to the fact that it was originally supposed to be Becky vs Carmella, and then Charlotte was inserted and went on to win. So after seeing that the fans wouldn't portray Becky as the villainess in this story, they did away with heel Becky, and The Man ended up being born.

However, as the saying goes, "Third time's a charm," and I think the current villainous version of Becky Lynch seems to be working well. The first SmackDown after SummerSlam kicked off with Becky talking about her return and her victory, and even borrowing from fellow countryperson Conor McGregor with the line, "I'd like to apologize...to absolutely nobody!" (said it much better than Conor, IMO). She was interrupted by not only Bianca, but also Carmella, Zelina Vega, and Liv Morgan, and it was Bianca to directly asked Becky for a rematch, only to be refused. Bianca later defeated the other three potential challengers in an elimination match to earn a title opportunity, and a week later, Bianca again approached Becky with another challenge.

Becky refused Bianca's challenge yet again, but she would be approached by WWE officials Adam Pearce and Sonya Deville backstage, with both of them informing Becky that Bianca would get her rematch--only for Becky to say "When the champ's ready." In response, Adam and Sonya informed Becky that she would defend against Bianca at Extreme Rules; news that wasn't pleasing to The Man.

I love that the first match for Extreme Rules is a women's match, and I love even more that it's this one! If they do this right, this could be a long feud that spans two PPVs, which would be more than enough time to fully cement Becky as a viciously evil villainess. It just now hit me: all of WWE's Four Horsewomen are heels, wow! Extreme Rules takes place on September 26; the first time that the event will take place in September.

If you like this story, feel free to click the heart below, and if you really love this story, feel free to leave a tip (if you want)!