Did you notice that the WWE PPV advertised during WrestleMania 35 was Money In The Bank rather than Backlash and think that was odd? The writer of this article who was very aware Backlash was coming up in June because she lives within driving distance from San Diego, where it was scheduled to occur on June 16, and was thinking of going to it sure did!
Per a report by California wrestling publication SoCal Uncensored, Backlash 2019 wasn’t advertised because it was canceled. According to the website’s sources, this cancellation occurred because WWE’s next event in Saudi Arabia was moved to June 7 from a previously scheduled date unknown to the public. Much like the Saudi government is hard on women’s rights activists, arresting fourteen in the past month, having PPVs nine days apart would be hard on the WWE schedule.
The best/worst (no, not in that way) part of the report has got to be this insider tidbit:
It was also mentioned to us that some people didn’t think the optics of having a pay-per-view called Backlash immediately following what is likely to be another controversial event in Saudi Arabia would be good.
With this part of the report in mind and considering how mentions of where Crown Jewel would take place were dropped part of the way through the promotion of the event due to the international political controversy surrounding the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, it’ll be interesting to see if we hear about this upcoming show in Saudi Arabia on WWE programming at all.
