User blog comment:Fliu/Chapter 954: An Unexpected Turn of Events/@comment-31036366-20190831044353/@comment-108.83.222.210-20190903053352

I highly doubt he would expect to lose to Luffy, even the news of Big Mom's "defeat" (Technically she didn't exactly win that conflict) seem to cause annoyance to him rather then fear. Besides, he has faced Luffy and whatever prompted this is likely connected to some other plan or reason. That being said, while this does increase the difficulty it also increases the potential gain if Luffy is able to get another victory here even if it is just a symbolic one. They probably hope to break the deadlock created by the world government and the other Yonko most likely. We will have to see what comes next.