WWE News: Mustafa Ali reveals backstage reaction to awkward botch that almost injured Daniel Bryan 

What's the story?

Mustafa Ali wrestled Daniel Bryan a few weeks ago on Smackdown Live and after delivering his famous backward 450, it was obvious that he had come down a little out of fashion and many fans feared for Bryan given his recent history with injury, but Mustafa Ali has only recently revealed how the superstars backstage reacted to the bump on his first night on the main roster.

In case you didn't know...

Ali made quite the impression in his first match on SmackDown Live against Daniel Bryan which was just a week before Christmas and was the beginning of a new era in WWE. This meant that Ali was under immense pressure and despite this, he was able to put on a fantastic show before his 450 seemed to leave a mark.

Errors happen in WWE all the time, but since Bryan had a history of injury when it comes to his neck area, many of the WWE Universe were worried, before it was revealed that The WWE Champion was infact absolutely fine.

The heart of the matter

Ali recently appeared on the Talk is Jericho podcast where he was able to reveal what the backstage reaction was to the move, which happened on his first night on SmackDown Live.

"Obviously, when that happened anyone that could see, could see that I was like, ‘Holy, I just landed on his face.’ Luckily when we came back we found out that it was his chin. Still, you could knock someone out easily like that, but it was almost like, as it happened, you just see me kind of trying to make myself lighter, so that I don’t squish him, but I got him. One, you’re thinking, ‘Did I just mess up the WWE Champion? What’s gonna happen? This is my first night. There goes my push.’"

This was as part of the first match of two tapings ahead of the festive period, so Ali was forced to readjust and then move forward because he had another match that night.

"You’re freaking out and it was extra stressful because it was a night where we were taping the second SmackDown for Christmas, so I had a match right after that, so I was trying to get mentally ready for that and the finish was that move again. Now, you’re talking about playing games with your mind, ‘Oh, am I gonna land on ‘Cien’ with this one too?’ Luckily, I’ve got some good brothers back there giving me a pep talk, ‘Get your head in the game. He’s fine.’ Literally, they checked him. He was fine. Bryan came and assured me he was fine. I profusely apologized that it happened. Everyone talked and they were like, ‘You realize people get knocked out doing kicks? People get knocked out doing punches. You were doing a backward 450 and you clipped a dude and you didn’t even hurt him. It looked nasty, but you clipped him. Relax.’ Obviously, to me, it was the end of the world, ‘Oh my God!’ Thankfully, he wasn’t injured. Thankfully, nothing came of this & no backlash for me. Obviously, some people are gonna nit pick it like, ‘He’s unsafe.’ I was like, ‘I’ve been wrestling 16 years and I kneed a guy in the face accidentally.’ It wasn’t sloppy. It just happened and I can’t explain why. I thought the jump was good. I thought the rotation was good. I thought his positioning was good. It was just off," he said via Wrestlezone.

What's next?

As already stated, the move didn't injure Bryan and even though Ali was worried about it, it didn't ruin his push on SmackDown Live either, it appears that it was just something that was unavoidable at the time.

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