The 2020 Betfred World Club Challenge was the 28th staging of the World Club Challenge. It featured

Super League The Super League (officially known as the Betfred Super League due to sponsorship from Betfred and legally known as Super League Europe), is the top-level of the British rugby league system. At present the league consists of twelve teams, of wh ...

champions

St Helens R.F.C. St Helens R.F.C. is a professional rugby league club in St Helens, Merseyside who compete in the Super League, the top tier for rugby league in Great Britain. They are the current Champions, having won the last 4 consecutive titles, and becom ...

, and

NRL The National Rugby League (NRL) is an Australasian rugby league club competition which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory and New Zealand. The NRL formed in 1998 as a joint partnership ...

winners Sydney Roosters. This was the third time these two teams had met in the World Club Challenge, with Sydney claiming a 25–2 victory in the inaugural World Club Challenge in

1976 Events January * January 3 – The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights enters into force. * January 5 – The Pol Pot regime proclaims a new constitution for Democratic Kampuchea. * January 11 – The 1976 Phila ...

, and a 38–0 victory in

2003 File:2003 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The crew of STS-107 perished when the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during reentry into Earth's atmosphere; SARS became an epidemic in China, and was a precursor to SARS-CoV-2; A des ...

. Victory over St Helens means Sydney now have a record 5 titles, and become the only team to retain their title, as well as maintaining their 100% record in the World Club Challenge.

Background

St Helens R.F.C.

St Helens finished 1st in the regular season, to earn a home tie against 2nd place

Wigan Warriors The Wigan Warriors are a professional rugby league club in Wigan, Greater Manchester, England, which competes in the Super League. Formed in 1872 as Wigan Football Club, Wigan was a founding member of the Rugby Football League, Northern Rugby ...

in the semi finals. Saints dominated the first half by scoring 4 tries inside 20 minutes, before Wigan hit back with 1 of their own. Saints were irresistible in the first half, and led 26–6 with tries from Theo Fages, Kevin Naiqama, Luke Thompson, and

Jonny Lomax } Jonathan Lomax (born 4 September 1990) is an English professional rugby league footballer who plays for St Helens in the Super League, and England and Great Britain at international level. A versatile player, Lomax is primarily a but is equ ...

. Wigan knew they had a job to do in the 2nd half, but this was not to be, as Saints

Zeb Taia Zeb Taia (born 11 October 1984) is a former professional rugby league footballer who played as a forward for both New Zealand and the Cook Islands at international level. He played for the Parramatta Eels, Newcastle Knights and the Gold Coast ...

's score and a Mark Percival double extended the lead to send Saints to their first grand final in 5 years. This was also Justin Holbrook's final game for Saints at the

Totally Wicked Stadium Totally Wicked Stadium is a rugby league stadium in the Peasley Cross area of St. Helens. Known as Langtree Park until 2017, it has a capacity of over 18,000 and is the home ground of St Helens R.F.C. The stadium was granted full planning per ...

, without losing a single home game all season. Saints then defeated Salford 23–6 in the grand final, making them champions and qualifying them for the World Club Challenge. He left at the end of the season to take on the vacant coaching role at Gold Coast Titans and was replaced by

Kristian Woolf Kristian Woolf (born 6 July 1975) is an Australian professional rugby league football coach who is the assistant coach of the Dolphins in the NRL and the head coach of Tonga at international level. He previously was the head coach of St Hele ...

for the 2020 Season.

Sydney Roosters

The Roosters finished the

2019 NRL season The 2019 NRL season was the 112th season of professional rugby league in Australia and the 22nd season run by the National Rugby League. The Sydney Roosters became the first team to win back-to-back Premierships since the Brisbane Broncos in 1992 ...

in second place with 36 points. In their first game of the finals, they defeated the South Sydney Rabbitohs 30–6 at home, earning themselves a one week break. They then played the Melbourne Storm, again at home, and they won that match 14–6, putting them in the

Grand Final Primarily in Australian sports, a grand final (sometimes colloquially abbreviated to "grannie") is a game that decides a sports league's premiership (or championship) winning team, i.e. the conclusive game of a finals (or play-off) series. Sy ...

. They went on to defeat the Canberra Raiders 14–8, claiming the 2019 premiership and qualifying them for the World Club Challenge.

Match details

References

{{World Club Challenge 2020 in Australian rugby league 2020 in English rugby league World Club Challenge Sydney Roosters matches St Helens R.F.C. matches World Club Challenge