WWE history: Roman Reigns & The Undertaker team up in never-before-seen match

The backstory

Following his WrestleMania 33 defeat against Roman Reigns in April 2017, The Undertaker seemingly signalled the end of his career when he placed his hat, coat and gloves down in the middle of the ring and the biggest event on WWE’s calendar ended with a ‘GONG’.

Reigns bragged about his famous victory in the weeks that followed, claiming that WWE is “my yard now”, and fans were left to wonder whether the legendary “Deadman” would ever step foot in a WWE ring again.

Fast forward to 2018 and, after eight months of speculation about his in-ring future, The Undertaker cut a typically cryptic promo at Raw 25 in January before going on to defeat John Cena in three minutes at WrestleMania 34 and Rusev in a casket match at the Greatest Royal Rumble.

The Undertaker's final MSG appearance?

Competing in a rare untelevised match, The Undertaker teamed with Roman Reigns and Braun Strowman to defeat Kevin Owens, Elias and Baron Corbin in a six-man tag team encounter at Madison Square Garden on July 7, 2018.

The WrestleMania icon received huge crowd reactions and a long standing ovation in what was his first match inside the historic arena in eight years.

One of the most notable moments came when Reigns tagged in The Undertaker and the veteran put together a highlight reel of his well-known move set during a one-on-one altercation with Owens.

In the end, ‘Taker pinned Owens following a Tombstone Piledriver before shaking hands with Reigns – the man who many people thought had retired him – in a show of respect after the match.

The aftermath

Although the unusual alliance did not immediately continue with a storyline on Raw or SmackDown Live in 2018, The Undertaker surprisingly joined forces with Roman Reigns on the June 24 episode of Raw in 2019 to help him take out Shane McMahon and Drew McIntyre.

The former WrestleMania rivals will now team together for the first time on television to face McMahon and McIntyre in a No Holds Barred tag team match at Extreme Rules.