The Women's Challenge Cup is a rugby league

knockout A knockout (abbreviated to KO or K.O.) is a fight-ending, winning criterion in several full-contact combat sports, such as boxing, kickboxing, muay thai, mixed martial arts, karate, some forms of taekwondo and other sports involving striking, a ...

competition organised by the Rugby Football League. The competition started in 2012.

History

2012–2016: Foundations

The Women's Challenge Cup was set up in 2012 to run alongside the men's competition to give women's rugby teams more competitive games and to give the sport a bigger profile by attaching it to the

Challenge Cup The Challenge Cup is a knockout rugby league cup competition organised by the Rugby Football League, held annually since 1896, with the exception of 1915–1919 and 1939–1940, due to World War I and World War II respectively. It involves am ...

. Most teams in the first few years were community clubs and had no links to professional men's clubs. In 2014 the RFL set up an amateur league for the women's game, to help more women's teams get regular game time.

2017–present: Exposure

In 2018 the competition started to receive a much higher profile, with the final being broadcast live on the BBC Sport website. In 2019 bookmakers Coral agreed to sponsor the competition – in addition to their sponsorship of the men's

– and it was also announced that the final of the 2019 Cup would be played as part of a triple-header with the semi-finals of the men's

2019 Challenge Cup The 2019 Challenge Cup known as the Coral Challenge Cup for sponsorship reasons, is the 118th staging of the Challenge Cup, the main rugby league knockout tournament for teams in the Super League, the British National Leagues and a number of inv ...

at the University of Bolton Stadium on 27 July 2019. The 2019 competition also saw the introduction of a new trophy commissioned by the RFL.

Finals

List of teams by number of wins

Challenge Shield

Between 2012 and 2019 teams that were knocked out of the cup in the early rounds went on to compete in the Challenge Shield competition.

Sponsorship

References

{{Women's Challenge Cup 2012 establishments in England Women's rugby league competitions in England National cup competitions