When news broke during the Royal Rumble that Matt Riddle and Brock Lesnar had finally met backstage face-to-face, wrestling fans rubbed their hands in glee.

Were they finally about to witness two former MMA stars go at it in a WWE ring?

Well, apparently not.

Lesnar reportedly told Riddle to stop using his name to try and build a match that is never going to happen, in what must have been disappointing news to hear for a man who has been saying for years that he's going to 'retire' Lesnar.

Speculation suggested that Vince McMahon was unhappy with Riddle due to his persistent call-outs of Lesnar, with Dave Meltzer suggesting that Vince sees Riddle as an 'outside guy' with 'no respect for the hierarchy of the business.

With the apparent heat from the big boss towards Riddle, you'd be forgiven for thinking that he's in the bad books with WWE.

But Triple H moved to shut down any rumours on a pre-NXT TakeOver: Portland conference call yesterday that Vince and Riddle had a disagreement.

“To be honest with you, I haven’t asked anybody about it. Vince didn’t express his disapproval of anything that was said, and I’m sure if there were an issue, he would’ve called me directly, said The Cerebral Assassin, per eWrestlingNews.

"He’s not shy about that. I didn’t see that. I heard what you heard about the conversation between the two.

"Matt is Matt. Brock is Brock. They had a conversation that’s between them. They’re men. I don’t mean that to be disparaging of anybody. They’re grown adults let’s just say that. They had a conversation.”

“To be honest, I read something [and I go], ‘I don’t know if that’s a work, that’s legit. I don’t know.’ I don’t care either way from that standpoint.

“I’m entertained by it," HHH continued. "If somebody has a problem with it, they come to me, and I’ll help deal with the problem. Right now, it is what it is.

“Matt is an incredibly talented performer. He’s very vocal. He has his own personality and his own viewpoints on things. That’s a great thing.

I think Brock is of the opinion, my guess would be, if you’re gonna write checks, you better be able to cash them, and I think Matt writes checks and he can cash in his mind.

"Who knows? We’ll see where it goes. The sky’s the limit for Matt Riddle as a performer, and we’ll see where it all goes.”

The fact that the WWE Performance Center YouTube channel filmed Riddle talking about Lesnar indicates that WWE have no problem in pushing this potential match, even though Lesnar seemingly doesn't want the smoke.

But if Lesnar wants the money, then there will be a lot on the table to make that a huge match down the line.