10 Big Concerns Heading Into WWE WrestleMania Backlash
Thirteen titles for Charlotte and a Swiss squashed over three whole hours.
WrestleMania Backlash could be alright.
WWE's empty arena pay-per-views have been a step above their events with actual paying audiences in attendance, which sounds weird to type still to this day. It's a true statement, though, as their annual marquee shows over the past fourteen months have been noticeably better than before.
Fastlane, for example, is often entirely needless at the best of times, yet this year's offering to the lineage was rounded off by a superb main event of Roman Reigns vs. Daniel Bryan. Alongside that were crackers from Drew McIntyre and Sheamus, Riddle and Mustafa Ali, and Big E and Apollo Crews. For the first time, Fastlane was legitimately a show you had to watch.
The same fate could easily apply to WWE's May 2021 event. Putting the WrestleMania title in front of Backlash is clearly a way to get more fans invested in the usual post-'Mania lull. The card thus far is certainly looking that way at least; in particular, Bianca Belair and Bayley's SmackDown Women's Championship outing, and the Universal Championship bout between Roman Reigns and Cesaro would easily be contenders for WWE's match of the year.
Sounds perfect, right? It will be, unless...
10. Adnan Virk Isn't Pay-Per-View Quality
Look at that smile.
That is the smile, albeit a clearly forced one, of a previously accomplished sports broadcaster with a legitimately outstanding CV to his name that is being thrust in at the deep end by having to present decent commentary on a weekly basis for what is the worst weekly professional wrestling show in existence. No one can do such a thing because Raw is just a bad show.
Adnan Virk, however, hasn't helped things. Granted, he's still relatively new to the WWE landscape, having only debuted as a Raw commentator on the 12 April edition. Although this year's Raw After 'Mania episode was a letdown on many, many levels, it's still a tough task for anyone new to WWE's announce booth.
That makes WrestleMania Backlash the first pay-per-view for Adnan's WWE career. He needs to be a step above his work on Monday nights, which has been quite lacklustre thus far. If he can't even do a good job on weekly television to the point that it's worked into a Sheamus promo, then how does he expect to fair on a pay-per-view stage?
Bad commentary massively detracts from what could be an otherwise very good professional wrestling match. Where Virk lacks on Sunday must be backed up by Corey Graves and Byron Saxton.