Finn Bálor Reveals Why Street Fight Stipulation Was Added to His Match With Dominik Mysterio at WrestleMania 42

WWE Superstar Finn Bálor recently revealed why his scheduled match with Dominik Mysterio at WrestleMania 42 was turned into a Street Fight at the last moment.

Tensions between Dominik and Finn finally came to a head during the Road to WrestleMania 42, with The Judgment Day eventually turning on Bálor. This led to a singles match being announced for The Show of Shows, with Bálor promising to bring his Demon persona back for one night.

However, what was initially billed as a standard match turned into a Street Fight when WrestleMania rolled around. During an appearance on INSIGHT with Chris Van Vliet, Finn opened up about working through an injury during his Hell in a Cell match with Edge at WrestleMania 39. He revealed that he suffered a partial tear leading up to the show.

The former Universal Champion then revealed that he suffered a rib injury while performing a spot on Monday Night RAW three weeks ahead of ‘Mania 42. He added that the injury led to WWE adding the Street Fight stipulation to the match.

Here’s what Finn Bálor said:

“A similar thing happened this year at WrestleMania with Dom. I had gotten beat up by the Judgment Day. I think I’d been out for a week. Dom was having a match against Penta on Raw. It’s like three weeks before Mania. I do the run-in, I come back, I beat up JD, I beat up Dom, I throw him over the top rope, and I’m in street clothes. I’m gonna do the dive over the top rope, but I’m in street clothes. So, as I’m running, I wear baggier T-shirts, and I go, ‘Oh, I haven’t done the dive in a while,’ and I wonder, ‘Is this T-shirt gonna get snagged on the top rope, and am I gonna get stuck like Top Dolla?’ This was going through my head as I’m running against the ropes, so as I’m coming back I see the boys outside the ring.

“I said I gotta jump extra high, and I gotta tuck faster than I normally tuck, because I normally kind of extend a little bit, but I tucked early, and as I tucked, I popped a rib right in the air, not on the landing or when they caught me, in the air. I popped the rib, and I remember the boys caught me. ‘Great, put me down.’ I stood up, I fired up like this, and I said, ‘F*ck, I popped the rib, no!’ Then again, same situation, three weeks to Mania. How long does the rib take to heal? Oh, sh*t! So then now it was again just this last WrestleMania; it was a race against time to get the rib. The problem with the rib recovery is you can’t do anything; there’s no rehab, and you can’t do anything really. So it was kind of touch and go, and that was kind of a factor in why the match was changed to a street fight because I was able to rely more on the toys, the weapons, and stuff than have to actually, you know, wrist locks and twists and rolls and stuff like that.”

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Despite the injury, The Demon defeated Dominik Mysterio in a highly entertaining match at ‘Mania 42.