Lizzy Rain reflects on NXT debut experience
Lizzy Rain made her NXT debut this week against Nikkita Lyons.
Speaking with Busted Open After Dark, Rain expressed being overwhelmed by her WWE debut. She reflected on the 2023 torn ACL surgery setback which she felt would disrupt her momentum on the indies. Additionally, she praised Lyons’ performance as her first NXT opponent.
“I’m overwhelmed. It’s what I’ve, what I’ve always wanted, what I’ve worked the last few years on the indies for, what all my heartbreak was for when I had a knee surgery, It just means so much to be on WWE TV. It just absolutely blows my mind. I just thought I’d never get there. I did, hands on heart, thought I’d never get there. And now here I bloody am. So it’s very surreal, very surreal. And Nikkita, I was so happy I got to wrestle her for my first match. I couldn’t have asked for a better opponent for my first match.”
Rain dwelled on her inspiration to be a wrestler since childhood but her mother and family did not take it seriously. In later years, she felt competing in WWE was a far-fetched dream especially since she began training at 23-years of age instead of younger like many of the other talents. She proceeded to talk about Pretty Deadly’s (Kit Wilson & Elton Prince) influence on her decision to commence in-ring training.
“I thought, ‘well, you know what? I’ll give this wrestling thing a go and see if it actually does take off’. Because NXT UK was a thing and that kind of gave me hope. I heard Pretty Deadly speaking and I heard their accents and I was like, ‘oh, I know the accent, that’s my accent. They must wrestle around me. They must have trained around me’. So I messaged one of them and they got back to me and said there’s a training school 20 minutes away from you. And I was like, ‘oh, okay, maybe this can become a thing.’”
When Lizzy Rain found out about her WWE signing
Rain revealed that she was informed about her NXT debut during WrestleMania weekend.
“I haven’t really had a lot of guidance in what they expect from me. It’s all just happened very fast. They’ve just thrown me in the deep end. Got a text during WrestleMania, ‘You’re filming this vignette for NXT’ and was like, ‘Oh! Really? Okay. I didn’t know this was gonna be happening so fast. I just did my dark match last week’ and so, yeah, it just all happened in a flash so, I haven’t even got to that point yet of what’s expected of me.”
WWE announced Rain and a few others as new recruits in the Performance Center in March. Rain, formerly competed as Rayne Leverkusen on the indies, confirmed her ring name change earlier this month. She is the niece of late Iron Maiden drummer Clive Burr, whose legacy contributed to her Maiden of Metal persona.
Rosanne Raphael is a wrestling writer with over three and a half years of experience covering all things related to the industry. From a kindergarten teacher to PR Associate to turning her lifelong passion for the industry into a career, Rosanne is currently writing for F4W Online where she focuses on wrestling news, analysis, and storytelling.
Rosanne previously contributed to Sportskeeda as an Assistant Content Manager.
When not consumed by wrestling, Rosanne is a musician and an aspiring artist.