Rohan Raja Says Empty Arena Debut Improved Him

Rohan Raja signed with WWE in November 2020. He made his debut for the company on the April 29, 2021 episode of NXT UK against Teoman in a singles match. The show took place in an empty arena due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Raja told the In The Weeds podcast that he was able to lock in for the match despite the lack of an audience. He recalled feeling strange playing a babyface with no crowd to feed off during his first few matches.

Raja noted that seeing Shawn Michaels, Matt Bloom and William Regal sitting there as he walked through gorilla made it feel like go time. He said that as soon as the camera light turned red while waiting behind the curtain he was in the zone.

Raja explained that it almost did not feel like the crowd was missing because millions of people were watching on the network at the time. Raja said that without a crowd he had more timing to register where to put things in the structure of the match.

He added that at the next level wrestlers can change and restructure things on the fly depending on what the crowd is feeling. Raja stated that the biggest downside was that every bump hurt much more without the crowd.