Rugby League

Challenge Cup Final

Saturday 8th June 2024

Kick Off 15.07

Warrington Wolves 8 Wigan Warriors 18, attendance 64,845

@ Wembley Stadium

Wembley

London

HA9 0WS

£30 Admission, plus £1 Booking Fee

£10 Programme, didn’t bother buying.

I’d never been to a Rugby League Challenge Cup Final before, as it is normally held on a Saturday during the football season, but today was the perfect opportunity to put that right. It was also the chance to make a first visit to the ‘new’ Wembley Stadium. I’d last been here in 1992, but that stadium was demolished in the early 2000’s and replaced by a brand new 90,000 all seated stadium, which opened in 2007. Tickets were purchased online the day before the match, via the Rugby Football League and were available for collection at the stadium. We’d opted for top tier seats, where the view was distant (that’s an understatement!), but the sight lines were excellent. Unfortunately, the ground is just too big. Well, for rugby league, that is, despite this being two of the bigger names of the sport contesting the final. Probably okay if it’s full, but with the entire tier opposite us closed and a rather pathetic crowd of under 65,000 present, there was very little atmosphere. Infact, underwhelming/disappointing would describe it perfectly.

The ticket covered all three finals taking place today. I had absolutely zero interest in arriving early enough to watch the Women’s Challenge Cup Final, which kicked off at 11.45, but would certainly have watched the 1895 Cup Final between Sheffield Eagles and Wakefield Trinity, had it been scheduled as a curtain raiser to the main event, rather than scheduled for the 17.45 start that it did have. The Challenge Cup Final was moved from the original kick off time of 15.00 to 15.07, in order to honour the passing of legendary former Leeds Rhinos and Great Britain player Rob Burrow (played in the No.7 shirt) who died this week from motor neurone disease, at the age of just 41.

Rather than drive, the train took the strain today, as far as Victoria, with the journey completed via London Underground to Wembley Park. It is then a short walk up ‘Wembley Way’ (now appears to be Olympic Way) to the stadium. Certainly not as iconic as seeing the old ‘twin towers’ and due to the vast amount of buildings around here nowadays, the stadium doesn’t look that impressive as you approach. Tickets were easily collected and there are plenty of restaurants in the area to mean avoiding buying anything inside the stadium. As you’d expect, once inside, the food/drink prices were extortionate. Never seems to stop vast numbers being happy to be ripped off though.

As for the game itself, Warrington will have been disappointed, to say the least. They just never got going, despite taking the lead with an early penalty from Josh Thewlis to lead 2-0, after both sides had a man sin binned in the opening minutes, Mike Cooper for Wigan, followed shortly afterwards by Matt Dufty for Warrington, both for high challenges. A grubber kick, from man of the match Bevan French, saw Zach Eckersley touch down for Wigan, before Harry Smith converted to make it 2-6. French then scored a try himself, getting the ball down despite facing backwards as he crossed the line and it was again converted by Smith, to see them increase the lead to 2-12, which remained the score at halftime.

Midway through the second half Wigan increased their lead to 2-18, when Liam Farrel broke down the left to score, which was again converted by Smith. Warrington briefly hit back when Dufty cut inside to score, converted by Thewlis, to pull it back to 8-18, but they never looked like adding any more points and Wigan comfortably hung on for what was an easy win, adding the Challenge Cup (record 21st time) to the World Club Challenge, Super League Leaders’ Shield and Grand Final wins in 2023, meaning they are only the third team to hold all four trophies at the same time, following Bradford Bulls in 2003 and St. Helens in 2007.

I was quite surprised that we were back on a train within minutes of the final whistle and all connections homeward went smoothly. Won’t be becoming a regular on the trains though….