Natalya is sitting high on top of the tag team women’s division since she and Tamina won the WWE Women’s Tag Team Championships a number of week’s ago.
However, prior to the team forming the plan was to have her enter a rivalry with Sasha Banks. Banks at the time was SmackDown Women’s Champion and had feuded with Carmella prior to the Royal Rumble. Natalya and Banks haven’t faced each other one-on-one since an episode of RAW in August 2019.
While speaking to Renee Paquette on her Oral Sessions podcast, Natalya had said the following about the plans that never developed.
“I was supposed to go into a rivalry with Sasha Banks earlier this year and everything changed when Bianca won the Rumble. I was so excited about wrestling Sasha because I think she’s one of the greatest women’s wrestlers in the world, if not the best. TJ said to me, ‘You and Tamina need to be a team. You would be perfect together.’ He pulled up a picture and showed the family history, Owen with Yokozuna, the Headshrinkers, the Bulldogs, the Hart Foundation. ‘Look at all the greatness your families have done together. You guys should be a team. You should pitch it.’ I went from being sad not working Sasha because I had all these ideas and we were training together and Sasha lit this fire in me. Then I had this new fire in me of teaming with Tamina. TJ was the inspiration behind it.” [h/t Fightful]
She then recalled pitching the idea to Vince McMahon.
“I went to Tamina, told her I was going to pitch it, and we were off to the races. I convinced [Vince] to give us a chance and show him what we could do. Whenever I pitch anything to Vince, he’s always given me a chance and heard me out and show him, even if he didn’t agree with it. When we were the Hart Dynasty, we were never supposed to be. I went to Vince in Nashville and said, ‘I have an idea.’ He didn’t want to go with it. I said, ‘Please, give me a chance and let us show you.’ He said, ‘Nattie, because you came to me, I’ll give you a chance.’ It was similar to what happened with myself and Tamina. We showed him and hit a home run with every opportunity we were given. We focused on every detail and performance. It was fun to take Tamina and transform her from being someone that was unselfish and in the shadows and doing something totally different. As we were doing that, the powers that be were like, ‘Wow, they’re having so much fun.'”
During a different part on the podcast, Natalya and Tamina both agreed and doubled down on wanting to defend their titles to all competitors. Whether it is Naomi/Lana, Mandy/Dana, Ruby/Liv, or even Candice/Indi regardless of the fact that they are also champions. They want to be fighting champions and although they have had fun fighting former champs Shayna Baszler and Nia Jax they are ready for new competitors.
Who would you most want to see Natalya and Tamina face next? Leave your thoughts below.
