BREAKING: John Cena’s ‘WWE Royal Rumble’ Status In Question Following Injury On ‘Raw’

john cena

WWE star John Cena, who returned to the ring in the beginning of this year, making appearances on both Raw and Smackdown Live, was scheduled to compete in this Sunday night’s Royal Rumble match.

Last week on Raw, Cena competed in a Fatal Four Way match to determine who would face Brock Lesnar for the Universal Title at the Rumble after Vince McMahon pulled Braun Strowman from the match. The Fatal Four way bout was won by Finn Balor, who will challenge Lesnar at the PPV on Sunday.

Finn balor
Photo: WWE

WWE has released a new video revealing John Cena suffered an ankle injury during the Fatal Four Way match on Raw last week, and as a result his status for the PPV on Sunday is in jeopardy.

“We have learned that earlier today during a training session, John re-aggravated his injury leaving his status for this Sunday’s men’s Royal Rumble match in question,” the video reports.

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In an interesting update on this developing story, WWE has since removed the video from its YouTube channel, but the original video featured footage of John Cena favoring his ankle during the match on Raw last week, and it appears as if the injury might have occurred when Drew McIntyre had Cena in an ankle lock submission hold. WWE has also removed a second video from earlier this evening originally announcing Cena’s injury. As of this writing, it remains unknown why WWE released, then pulled, both videos, but the videos did explain Cena’s PPV status is in jeopardy.

Despite the breaking news videos being pulled from YouTube, WWE.com has published a breaking news story on Cena’s injury which reads as follows:

John Cena’s status in the Men’s Royal Rumble Match is in question following an apparent left ankle injury sustained during the main event of this past Monday night’s edition of Raw, WWE.com can now confirm.

In that match, The Cenation Leader faced Finn Bálor, Baron Corbin and Drew McIntyre for the right to challenge Brock Lesnar for the Universal Championship at the WWE Royal Rumble event. As seen in the video above, the injury seemingly occurred when McIntyre trapped Cena in the ankle lock submission hold. Cena can then be seen favoring his left ankle while leaving the ring after Raw went off the air.

The injury was exacerbated earlier today as Cena was training his legs at the gym, which has cast doubt on whether he will be able to compete in the 30-Man Royal Rumble Match this Sunday.

Stay with all of WWE’s digital platforms as more information becomes available.

We will continue to update this breaking news story as more information becomes available, and as of this writing PWInsider is reporting Cena is not backstage at WWE Raw tonight in Oklahoma.

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