As seen at the WWE Royal Rumble pay-per-view event from Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida, WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns beat Kevin Owens in a Last Man Standing Match.
Owens did an in-character interview on The Jake Asman Show. During it, he talked about not being happy with the referee in the match as the original referee stopped counting at 9 as Paul Heyman was not able to undo the handcuffs in time so Reigns had to take him out.
“I’m still recovery from the Royal Rumble. It was a pretty rough night for me. I was thrown off a 12-foot platform onto a bunch of tables, I got hit by a golf cart, I jumped off a forklift that was about 10 feet in the air, I burned my arm on a light that was part of our setup, and to top it all off, I didn’t win because I think a referee got paid off or something. A lot to recover from. I’ve never been cheated by a referee that way before. I used to play hockey in Canada as a kid so you would think it would happen before.”
“I had a few options on how to approach it. I could try to knock him out, but he’s a tough guy. I figured I could go after his legs so he couldn’t stand up, but it wasn’t working that well. He went a different route and tried to throw me off high things and hit me with vehicles. Different strategies. Towards the end, I turned his own trick on him. He brought handcuffs, I handcuffed him to something and I thought I had him, I really did have him. Some screw-ups from the referees and here I am, sitting in my car without the Universal Championship. It goes to show, no matter how prepared you are for a match in WWE, you never know how it’s going to go.”
H/T to Fightful