WWE Confirms Asuka Will Defend the Raw Women’s Championship Tonight at Elimination Chamber (UPDATED)

UPDATE: Despite the WWE noting Asuka would have a match tonight on the Kickoff Show, even that is now in doubt. WrestlingInc’s Raj Giri is now reporting that Asuka is not scheduled to wrestle, although the Card (as always) is Subject to Change. Hopefully Asuka at least gets some sort of angle for tonight, although it’s clear that WWE’s plan for her is in a state of constant flux.

Asuka will still have a Raw Women’s Championship match on tonight’s Elimination Chamber pay-per-view. Peter Rosenberg confirmed that Asuka will still have a match at Elimination Chamber tonight, even though her original opponent Lacey Evans dropped out she announced that she was pregnant. As there’s only five official matches on the Elimination Chamber card, it makes sense for the WWE to call an audible on the match even if it’s only a squash of some kind.

Asuka’s Elimination Chamber match was thrown into doubt on Monday when Evans announced her pregnancy on Monday Night RAW. Evans is in a storyline relationship with Ric Flair and strongly implied that the child was his on Monday, but various reports confirmed that Evans was actually pregnant. The WWE continued to advertise the Evans/Asuka match up until this morning, which created additional confusion about whether Evans was actually pregnant or not. Evans’ pregnancy came up during the Elimination Chamber Kickoff Show, so we’re guessing that Evans will continue to be involved in the inevitable build towards a match between Asuka and Charlotte, who look to be slated for a Wrestlemania match.

As to Asuka’s opponent, there are only a couple of names that really make sense for tonight. Lana is still hypothetically due a Raw Women’s Championship match, and the inevitable squash would help re-establish Asuka as a strong champion in the build towards Wrestlemania. Rhea Ripley, who is supposedly due to debut on Monday Night RAW, is another possibility, although it would be strange to kick off Ripley’s main roster stay with a potential championship loss. The other possibility is Charlotte, although that seems to be the direction the WWE was leaning to for (another) Wrestlemania match.

For now, Asuka is getting a mystery match which adds a little bit of intrigue to tonight’s Elimination Chamber PPV. The show starts at 7 PM ET and is available on the WWE Network.