10 Things WWE Wants You To Forget About 2018

2. The Greatest Fiasco

When WWE announced plans for a show set in Saudi Arabia with a vaguely nonsensical name, it was difficult not to be a little excited - if not for just how outrageously ludicrous it all was.

Jeddah's Greatest Royal Rumble promised a staggeringly large version of the eponymous match, with 50 men vying for a special green belt and a big gold trophy. Elsewhere, every main roster title was up for grabs. Given the enormous financial outlay being presented for the special, rumours began circulating about the sort of names who could be coaxed to the Kingdom. Hulk Hogan! Shawn Michaels! Yokozuna!

Then the dust of the desert began to settle, and the context of the Jeddah junket became much clearer. WWE would become puppets for the ruling family's push for soft-diplomacy, effectively presenting a propaganda puff piece designed to extol the regime's new-found 'progressiveness' - progressiveness which expressly forbade women to perform on the show.

In exchange for their integrity - and credibility, amidst their much vaunted 'Women's Evolution' - WWE pocketed somewhere in the region of a cool $50 million, hoping everyone would move on from the controversy. They didn't make it easy...