Sheamus has been a huge part of WWE for a decade and a half now, but he's never main evented WrestleMania. The Irish Superstar has been part of some very memorable matches in that time, both good (his clash against Triple H at WrestleMania 26) and disappointing (an 18-second win over Daniel Bryan at WrestleMania 28).
Last year, the Celtic Warrior stole the show alongside Drew McIntyre and Gunther in a hard-hitting Intercontinental Championship match. That was one of his best efforts and, in an interview with Virgin Media Sports Stories, Sheamus shared his belief that the bout should have main evented the Show of Shows.
"The IC Title. That's it. I want to main event WrestleMania too. I want to main event WrestleMania," he said. "That's another one. The IC Title and main event WrestleMania are the two things I want to do. I should have main evented WrestleMania last year or this year [2023]. It should have gone on last."
"It stole the show at WrestleMania. Nothing came close, match-wise, the match me, Gunther, and Drew had. I knew that was always going to be the case. I was so close [winning the title] at Mania, and it just got taken away from me."
It's hard to fault his passion, but this was the second night of WrestleMania and Undisputed Universal Champion Roman Reigns vs. Cody Rhodes ended up going on last...as it arguably should have done! Gunther has, however, elevated the Intercontinental title and it's easy to imagine it taking on an even bigger role this April.
Will that be the main event? Only time will tell.
In the same interview, Sheamus reflected on his WWE debut and revealed it was meant to happen quite a bit sooner. In fact, a whole six months sooner!
"Mark Henry and Tony Atlas were in a feud with Fit Finlay, and they're going to bring me up with Fit Finlay at a pay-per-view before December 2008. So I was supposed to go up in 2008, so about a year. I'd probably be there for about a year. And that all got scratched, I think, because Vince [McMahon] asked, 'What's the plans after that?' And he didn't have any plans after it. So I was about to go on the road....so I just came back to Ireland for Christmas."
"But that was the first moment where I'm like, 'Okay, they want to make sure when they bring me up, they use me, right? They're not just going to throw me into something.' That's when I knew like they're saying, like 'They're just waiting for the right moment to bring you up and the right thing.' And that finally happened in 2009, June 30th, when I debuted on ECW."
Do you think Sheamus is right about the Intercontinental Championship deserving the main event spot at last year's WrestleMania? As always, let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.