SmackDown Women Out To Make A Statement At WWE TLC

The women of Monday Night Raw have been making all of the headline’s recently as Sasha Banks and Charlotte recently became the first female superstars to step inside the Hell in a Cell structure.

They also became the first women in more than a decade to main event an episode of Monday Night Raw, and the first women to then do it twice when Sasha won back the WWE Women’s Championship in the main event of Raw this past week.

Add this to the fact that Charlotte and Bayley were the sole survivors at Survivor Series in the traditional elimination match, and it has led to many members of the WWE Universe believing that the Raw Women’s Division is much better than SmackDown’s.

The women of the Blue Brand are out to prove these doubters wrong this weekend when they compete in their own stipulated matches. Alexa Bliss and Becky Lynch make history by becoming the first women to compete in a tables match for a Women’s Championship.

The last time this happened was at TLC back in 2010 when Laycool faced Natalya and Beth Phoenix in a tag team tables match. So this will be the first female singles tables match.

Carmella and Nikki Bella also look to end what has been a lengthy feud in what could become a brutal match for both women to be a part of. This is the first No-disqualification match for both women, but it isn’t the first in WWE history.

Layla and Michelle McCool competed in a no disqualification match at Extreme Rules a few years ago and Vickie Guerrero also competed in a No-DQ match against Trish Stratus back in 2010.

Even though the women are not creating history like the women of the Raw roster have over the past few months, the stipulations that have been added to these matches prove that the company has gained a lot of faith in their female division over the past few months.

Alexa Bliss has stepped up her game since she has been promoted to the main roster and has to be considered the favourite going into her match against Becky Lynch this weekend, especially since she has already put the Champion through a table.

Last time these two collided, the referee failed to spot Alexa’s foot under the bottom rope when she tapped to the Disarmer so the SmackDown management team has decided to issue Alexa with this rematch.

The duo was set to fight for the Women’s title at No Mercy a few months ago but Becky had a mysterious illness the day of the event which prevented her from defending her title so Alexa instead was forced to face Naomi.

The tables aspect doesn’t add a lot to the match, except the fact that the women will instead be forced to use tables to their advantage and then the match will only end when one woman is put through a table. It also adds the No DQ clause to the match, which opens the door to any additional involvement from other women on the WWE roster.

Carmella and Nikki’s no DQ match was added because Nikki believes that it was Carmella who attacked her backstage at Survivor Series and forced her out of the elimination match. Carmella has insisted that it wasn’t her and it could potentially be instead revealed to have been Eva Marie if The Red Queen makes her WWE return this weekend.

Eva has been missing from WWE since the week before SummerSlam when Nikki returned and took her spot, Eva and Nikki are also both stars of Total Divas so a feud between the duo would not only make sense, but it would help to advertise the show during the current series.

Of course, these are not the only stipulated matches on Sunday night, Kalisto and Baron Corbin face off in a Chairs match, The Miz defends the Intercontinental Championship against Dolph Ziggler in a ladder match and Dean Ambrose fights for the WWE Championship in a TLC match with AJ Styles. The Tag Team Championships are also on the line as the strange combination of Randy Orton and Bray Wyatt face Champions Heath Slater and Rhyno. TLC is the final SmackDown event of 2016 so the roster will be wanting to go out in style.