A powerful new alliance appears to have formed in the wake of the SmackDown taping on June 30, as Cody Rhodes and Jey Uso made a surprise appearance to save Jacob Fatu from an attack by Solo Sikoa’s new faction. The moment occurred after the cameras stopped rolling for the episode scheduled to air on July 4.
The post-show rescue was prompted by the events of the evening’s main event, a tag team match that pitted Jacob Fatu and Jimmy Uso against Solo Sikoa and JC Mateo. While Fatu secured a pinfall victory over Sikoa during the broadcast, the show ended with Sikoa’s group getting the last word, driving Fatu through a table with a Shield-style Triple Power Bomb.
This escalating hostility follows the dramatic title change at Night of Champions on June 28. In that match, Sikoa captured the United States Championship from Fatu after interference from his newly formed Bloodline, which includes the returning Tonga Loa and the debuting Tala Tonga, formerly known as Hikuleo.
Sikoa later justified the betrayal, stating he was done giving chances to those who wouldn’t follow his lead. “I tried to tell Jacob to listen to me, follow my lead, [but] he didn’t wanna listen to me. So, you know what? I cut the dead weight,” Sikoa stated after the event. “I’ve been giving and giving. Now it’s my turn to take.”
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The assistance from Jey Uso is a significant development, given his own past issues with Fatu, suggesting that battle lines are being redrawn. With Fatu now positioned as the primary target of Sikoa’s dominant faction, he appears to have found powerful allies in Rhodes and his own cousin to even the odds in the ongoing family war. Fontes
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