Ronda Rousey reveals the extent WWE went to in order to keep her Royal Rumble debut a secret
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Ronda Rousey has revealed the extraordinary measures WWE took to ensure her Royal Rumble debut remained a secret.
The former UFC Bantamweight Champion was strongly rumoured to be joining the US sports entertainment giant for months on end.
In fact, speculation first began nearly four years ago, when Rousey sat in the front row at WWE's SummerSlam in August 2014.
She then helped The Rock beatdown Triple H and Stephanie McMahon in a heralded cameo at WrestleMania 31 in April 2015.
Ringside appearances at the Mae Young Classic tournament last September and an NXT live event in November added fuel to the fire.
(Image: © WWE)
(Image: © WWE)
Meanwhile, she was also spotted visiting WWE's Performance Center and meeting Triple H - aka WWE exec Paul Levesque - for dinner.
Yet somehow WWE's bigwigs managed to keep her arrival at the Wells Fargo Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on January 28 under wraps.
And some fans even believed that it couldn't be possible as Rousey was shooting the movie Mile 22 in Columbia at the time of the show.
In an exclusive interview with Mirror Sport, she detailed the great lengths WWE went to in order to keep fans guessing until the last minute.
Rousey said: "Getting there was quite an experience itself, in the age of social media and cellphones it's really hard to smuggle yourself into the country unnoticed.
(Image: © WWE)
(Image: © WWE)
"I started calling myself Rapunzel after a while, because once they snuck me from Columbia to Miami, they put me in a private plane which took me to Pittsburgh.
"They then took me to a car, then to the back of a hotel, then they had to block off the elevators and room service had to go past a security room, so room service wouldn't even see me...
"A car took me from the back of the hotel to meet me at a rendezvous point to take me to a bus, the bus then drove me to under the arena, and then I had to sit on a bus for seven hours! Ha ha."
The near 18,000-strong crowd erupted when Rousey strode out at the end of the women's Rumble match to confront winner Asuka and women's champions Alexa Bliss and Charlotte Flair.
(Image: © WWE)
(Image: Splash News)
She said: "It was quite the covert operation and I can't believe we even pulled it off, I really can't.
"It was really cool to kind of be able to surprise people like that, because it's hard to surprise people these days."
"I really wanted to just add to the event and not take away from it and I felt because of that moment, more people were aware of the first women's Royal Rumble and they [the women superstars in the match] got more of the attention they deserved because of it."
You can read the full exclusive interview with Ronda Rousey here.
Watch WWE WrestleMania 34 live on the WWE Network or Sky Sports Box Office on Sunday, April 8. You can follow all the action as it happens in the Mirror Sport WrestleMania 34 Live Blog.