Mustafa Ali Gets Nasty Black Eye From SmackDown Live Match With Randy Orton

Mustafa Ali challenged Randy Orton to a match on SmackDown Live this week, and all he got out of it was one big black eye.

Ali posted a photo of himself after Tuesday’s bout with “The Viper,” as his left eye was swollen almost completely shut.

Ali seemed to laugh off the injury, writing “Just trying to catch your eye” in the caption of the photo.

The former cruiserweight put up a valiant effort against the 13-time world champion, but wound up on the losing end after trying to hit the 054 Splash only to get pulled off the top rope and hit with an RKO in midair.

Ali and Orton will both take part in the upcoming Elimination Chamber match at the Feb. 17 pay-per-view of the same name alongside AJ Styles, Jeff Hardy and Samoa Joe as they try to win the WWE Championship from Daniel Bryan. The six men battled each other numerous times throughout the night, leading to a final sequence in the main event where Jeff Hardy nearly pinned Bryan only for Rowan to interfere. This prompted Orton and Joe to both come down and attack Bryan, but were cut off when Ali appeared and nailed both with a double dropkick.

But Ali’s night of pain wasn’t over, as he then attempted a suicide dive outside the ring only for Rowan to catch him and hit a Clawslam right on the announcer’s table.

Styles wound up getting the last laugh of the night as he took out Orton, nailed Joe with a Pele Kick and hit Hardy with a Phenomenal Forearm. Bryan headed backstage to avoid anymore fighting, and closed out the show with a backstage promo where he screamed that no one else would ever be world champion again.

Ali made his original WWE debut as an alternate in the 2016 Cruiserweight Classic, and wound up losing in the first round to Lince Dorado. He joined the 205 Live roster in December of that year, and began to win the fans over as he climbed all the way to the finals of the Cruiserweight Championship tournament, culminating in a match with Cedric Alexander at WrestleMania 34. Despite several more attempts, he never won the title.

In December 2018 Ali made his surprise debut on the SmackDown Live roster as an opponent for Bryan.