In the lead-up to Survivor Series 2017, a champion vs. champion match between WWE Champion Jinder Mahal and Universal Champion Brock Lesnar was planned, announced, and actively promoted. However, just weeks before the PPV took place, AJ Styles defeated Mahal to become the new WWE Champion, taking his place in that match against Lesnar.

Over the years, rumors have surfaced that Lesnar refused to work with Mahal at Survivor Series, leading to the title change. Mahal has now attempted to dispel that misconception by revealing during an interview with Chris Van Vliet on Insight that it wasn’t a “refusal,” but rather an attempt to do something different.

“There’s obviously a lot of misinformation on the internet,” Mahal said. “The headline came out, ‘Brock Lesnar refused to work with Jinder.’ I don’t think he refused. I just think he probably wanted to have a match with AJ because it’s a much better match style-wise. Brock and I are both heels. Who’s going to push who? It was going to be a flat match. He was just going to suplex me a couple times, maybe the Singh Bros would get involved. But the match he had with AJ was phenomenal, no pun intended. So yeah, I don’t think he refused to work with me. I just think Brock has some clout and he and Paul Heyman probably said, Hey, we need to talk to Vince and said we need to book the match with AJ Styles. That’s fine.”

After his release from WWE this year, Mahal recently made his debut in GCW under the ring name Raj Desi. He also recently revealed scrapped plans for another Punjabi Prison match.

H/T WrestlingInc