John Cena cheers on LPL teams ahead of 2019 LoL World Championship

William Davis Published 11/09/2019

Sorry Cloud9 and Team Liquid, WWE superstar and actor John Cena is rooting for the LPL teams in the 2019 League of Legends World Championship. 

The wrestler recently sent a cheer to the LPL teams, and if the video wasn’t enough of a surprise, he did it in perfect Mandarin.

“My WWE friends Austin and Cesaro told me that LPL is one of the most famous esports brands in China. They asked me if I can cheer for LPL at 2019 World Championship. I wanna say, LPL go go go!” said Cena in the video.

Cena has been at the center of WWE’s push to bring its brand of professional wrestling to the Chinese market. He will be in attendance at the WWE Live event in Shanghai on September 21, though he is not officially scheduled to compete at the event.

WWE using League of Legends to spread its brand

Austin “Xavier Woods” Watson and Claudio “Cesaro” Castagnoli are professional wrestlers signed to the WWE who happen to be avid League of Legends fans. Austin Creed runs the popular gaming YouTube channel UpUpDownDown that sees him play video games alongside other WWE personalities.

Austin and Cesaro were part of the WWE vs. NXT event where professional wrestlers competed in a game of League of Legends. Each team consisted of four wrestlers and one popular streamer. The event took place at the LCS studio in October.

The wrestlers also recently visited the LPL. In an interview with Score, the duo talked about the similarities between esports fans and WWE fans.

“I’d like to say it’s the same kind of nerd. We all went through a phase where we were getting made fun off for watching wrestling or playing video games. Now, we’re adults and we never stopped and those things are at the top of the entertainment charts and everybody now wants a piece of the pie but we’ve been here for years,” said Austin Creed.

They passionately talked about League of Legends and their expectations for the 2019 LoL World Championship. Cesaro, who attended the LCS Summer finals, said the he expects Invictus Gaming to defend the title. Austin believes that Royal Never Give Up can take the title this year.

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