WWE.com Jinder Mahal will face Randy Orton in a Punjabi Prison match at WWE Battleground.
Battleground, the latest pay-per-view from the WWE, is now just hours away. As usual, before the event gets started, there will be a kickoff show featuring one match. So what is the match that has been placed on the pre-show and not the actual pay-per-view card?
The Battleground kickoff show will feature the match between Tye Dillinger and Aiden English. This is the same match that took place on the Backlash pre-show back in May.
Tye Dillinger made his debut on the main roster in April immediately following WrestleMania 33. Though he is a fan favorite, he has yet to receive a major push on SmackDown Live. He feuded with Aiden English for a bit on SmackDown Live culminating in their match at Backlash, but since then, Dillinger has had not really been utilized in a big way. He did, however, recently get a chance to fight Jinder Mahal in a non-title match on SmackDown Live, which Mahal won after about 10 minutes.
Aiden English, meanwhile, spent three years in the tag team The Vaudevillains, a partnership which ended earlier this year when Simon Gotch was released from his WWE contract. Since then, English’s gimmick has been singing and intentionally annoying the audience, always being interrupted by another wrestler. Recently, he actually defeated Randy Orton on the July 4th episode of SmackDown Live, but that’s only because Orton got himself disqualified by attacking English with the steel steps.
The Battleground kickoff show will be streamed live via the WWE’s official YouTube account, although the event itself is only available to view on the WWE Network. The kickoff begins at 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time; outside of the match between Dillinger and English, the rest of the hour will consist of Renee Young and other WWE commentators providing a preview of the night’s events. Battleground will begin at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time.