Ahead of Giovanni Vinci's scheduled match with Chad Gable on RAW, the “Ring General” himself, Gunther, decided to ascend to the top of the WWE  announce table to send a message to the Alpha Academy and the rest of the WWE Universe about who has a legitimate shot at ending his Intercontinental Championship reign and who does not.

*spoiler alert* Gunther's list of viable opponents is a short one.

“On the journey of building the legacy as the best Intercontinental Heavyweight Champion of all time, the ‘Ring General' has arrived in Winnipeg. And as a European, I always look forward to coming to Canada, but after walking alone in the streets this morning and seeing all of your faces, I really see why they call this place the armpit of Canada,” Gunther declared.

“However, I'm here to address the next number-one contender for my Intercontinental Championship, Chad Gable. And I have to be honest, I was really impressed with his victory last week. In general, this man has been working hard for years, he's a former Olympian and maybe the best athlete this company has to offer. But I've achieved more in a year than he has in his own career. Come on, I know you all of you believe he's a threat to me; all of you believe Chad Gable may be the one who finally dethrones the ‘Ring General.' Ridiculous! At the end of the day-”

“Shooooosh!”

Before Gunther could continue, Gable and the rest of the Alpha Academy marched down to the ring and effectively let it be known that, in WWE, like in life, the bigger they come, the harder they fall.

“Gunther, two weeks ago, you put time on the clock and said Chad Gable couldn't last five minutes with ya,” Chad Gable said. “But I did, and I beat you at your own game, my friend. But it's funny, Gunter, because now you're the one who's on the clock. You're just weeks away from setting the all-time record for the longest-reigning Intercontinental Champion. There's just one thing standing in your way, and that one thing is a guy who's been waiting for an opportunity for ten years; that's been working for an opportunity for ten years. That one thing is Chad Gable nipping at your heels; it's Chad Gable chasing you down, coming to take that Intercontinental Championship, buddy.”

While the segment didn't end there, as Ludwig Kaiser took another pass at Maxxine Dupri before he had the taste smacked out of his mouth by the former leader of the Maximum Male Models, and then a pair of matches rounded out the segment between Gable and Vinci and Otis and Gunther, in the end, the “Master” of Alpha Academy got his point across and needles to say, the “Ring General” isn't quite as comfortable in his spot as the Intercontinental Champion as me might have thought when he arrived in the “armpit of Canada” earlier in the day.

Gunther reveals his thought on his match with Sheamus at Clash at the Castle.

Sitting down for an interview with Sean Ross Sapp in the lead-up to his match with Drew McIntyre at SummerSlam, Gunther was asked about another one of his signature matches, wrestling Sheamus at Clash at the Castle in Cardiff, Wales, mere miles away from where the “Ring General” became a legend in as a member of NXT UK.

Though Gunther was still relatively early in his IC Title reign at that point, the match still holds a special place in the “Ring General's” heart because it was one of his first big WWE Premium Live Events.

“The thing is, I guess to some degree, but everything happens so fast that it’s very hard to actually sit back sometimes and enjoy or reflect on what happened and stuff like that,” Gunther said via Fightful. “Overall, it was great. I think Clash at the Castle was good for me because it was the first big pay-per-view match for me, or PLE as we say now. I could just showcase myself, showcase to the audience what I do. I think the style of match I put on is nothing they have really seen on that scale before. I think that’s why it stood out and why it was special, and Sheamus was a great opponent. He doesn’t stop, so you really gotta put a lot of effort into keeping the guy down.”

Where does Gunther's match with Sheamus fall in his hierarchy of matches, which includes multiple five-star matches, according to Dave Melter at the Wrestling Observer? That mileage may vary, depending on the fan, but in the end, it was the “Ring General's” first big PLE with the IC Title around his waist and an important chapter in that story.