Mansoor was released by WWE on Thursday, along with at least 21 other performers. Mansoor, who was last seen in Maximum Male Models with Mace, signed with WWE in 2018 and became the first Saudi-born wrestler to compete in the company.
Mansoor was one of eight talents scouted during a 2018 WWE tryout in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, to coincide with WWE’s first major event in the Kingdom, the Greatest Royal Rumble. Mansoor and the other recruits were featured in a GRR segment in which they defeated Shawn Daivari and Ariya Daivari, and he was then signed to train at the WWE Performance Center in Orlando. In September 2018, he made his WWE NXT debut, losing to Ridge Holland at a live event, and his NXT TV debut came in February 2019 with a loss to Jaxson Ryker. Mansoor competed in a number of matches in 2018 and 2019, losing the majority of them before winning the 51-Man Battle Royal at Super ShowDown in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. He returned to NXT and won 11 of his 24 matches before defeating Cesaro (aka Claudio Castagnoli) at Crown Jewel 2019 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Following his victory over Cesaro, Mansoor embarked on a winning streak that included a victory over Dolph Ziggler at Super ShowDown 2020 in Riyadh. If you count his EVOLVE matches, his victory over Austin Theory at a WrestleMania On-Sale Party, and the 9 NXT live events he worked leading up to his victory over Cesaro, his streak now stands at 50 wins. Mansoor had previously worked for WWE Main Event and 205 Live, but his run came to an end on May 3, 2021, when he made his RAW debut and lost to Sheamus.
In an update, Mansoor and Mace discussed their WWE releases and careers on Twitch last night, and Mansoor stated that he was kept off WWE NXT TV for the most part because he wasn’t allowed to lose matches due to WWE’s agreement with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
This appears to confirm an April 2021 report from The Wrestling Observer, which stated that Mansoor’s winning streak was done to appease WWE’s partners in the Kingdom. The streak came to an end less than two weeks later.
Mansoor had a streak that lasted from September 20, 2019 to May 3, 2021. While WWE and the Saudi Ministry of Sport first announced a 10-year strategic partnership in 2018 to bring Premium Live Events to the Kingdom, it was announced on November 4, 2019 that the partnership would be extended until 2027, with two PLE shows in the Kingdom each year. It appears that Mansoor’s streak was discussed during the late-2019 expansion negotiations. Mansoor was portrayed as a big star at Super ShowDown in June, and he defeated Cesaro at Crown Jewel four days before the expansion was announced.
Mansoor appeared with other recruits at the 2018 Greatest Royal Rumble, won the 51-Man Battle Royal at Super ShowDown in June 2019, defeated Cesaro at Crown Jewel in October 2019, defeated Ziggler at Super ShowDown in February 2020, and defeated Mustafa Ali at Crown Jewel in October 2021. Mansoor did not return to his home country for Elimination Chamber in February 2022, Crown Jewel in November 2022, or Night of Champions in May of this year. He also did not work on Crown Jewel in November 2018, but that was prior to the push.
Mansoor, like the other wrestlers working the big-money shows in the Kingdom, mentioned on Twitch how well he was paid for wrestling in his home country.
“I got checks from those Saudi shows that, I never thought I would see that amount of money in my life,” he said.
