1976–1999: Origin and development The competition began unofficially in 1976 as a match between Sydney's
Eastern Suburbs and
Premiership winners
St. Helens. This inaugural clash was proposed as merely a 'one-off' game, and was played at the Sydney Cricket Ground on June 29, in the midst of the
1976 NSWRFL season. While some considered it an unnecessary disruption to both teams' campaigns in their respective domestic competitions, a healthy crowd of 26,856 turned out for the match, indicating that it was indeed a viable initiative. Leading into the match, St. Helens opted to play two warm-up games against a Queensland and Auckland representative team respectively, and lost both. In order to prove their triumph was legitimate, and not a result of fatigue on behalf of St. Helens, Eastern Suburbs challenged both representative sides who had defeated St. Helens. While Queensland declined the offer, Auckland eagerly accepted, and were ultimately defeated by the tricolours 26–22 in front of an enthusiastic home crowd. Long-serving Manly secretary Ken Arthurson proposed that the prize money should be split between the two clubs, regardless of the outcome, however, Lindsay argued that the game should be played under a 'winner-takes-all' stipulation, believing that it would result in the players and fans taking the game more seriously. Played on a dry October night, the match between Manly and Wigan was a tough, at times spiteful, encounter which attracted 36,895 spectators to Wigan's Central Park, most of whom spilled onto the ground at fulltime in celebration of the home side's 8–2 victory. However this did not eventuate.
2000–2014: Regular competition When it was resurrected in 2000, the World Club Challenge was once more played between the winners of the premierships in AUNZ and The UK. During this period it was contested annually in the United Kingdom in late January or early February, before the commencement National Rugby League season and the Super League season. Over this period Super League teams dominated the tournament winning 7 of 9 matches, and this led one Australian commentator to deride the competition, citing the British refusal to play the game outside of the UK, the effects of jet lag on an Australian team who arrived in England only a couple of days before the game, and wintry conditions as reasons for Australian team's poor performance. In addition, the games were being played at the beginning of the new season instead of at the end of the previous season, so the rosters of both sides had normally changed considerably, therefore the teams that took the field were not the ones that won the respective premierships. For these reasons, it was viewed as merely a pre-season warm up game by most Australasian teams and fans. Since the 2009 tournament, its popularity has increased with stronger crowds and also with Australian teams taking the concept more seriously, Australian teams were arriving earlier to acclimatize the players and often organising warm up games with other super league sides and this created a much stronger showing and improved results. This also led to an increased movement to having the tournament staged in Australia. During this period, the matches were fixtured in late February, still before the commencement of the National Rugby League season but in the early stages of the new Super League season. In mid-2012, a working party was established to look into the feasibility of conducting the match in either a neutral or Australian venue and also looking into the possibility of expanding the tournament. In February 2013, the changes to the tournament were gaining momentum with the NRL and Super League agreeing to begin alternating the World Club Challenge tournament between the UK and Australia. These changes were finally confirmed in November 2013, with both parties agreeing that the 2014 World Club Challenge would be the first held in Australia since 1994. In addition, commencing in 2015, the tournament would also be expanded to six teams. The World Club Challenge return to Australia in 2014 was a success with a solid crowd numbers of over 31,000, with the Sydney Roosters defeating the Wigan Warriors 36–14. During the game, Sydney's Michael Jennings became the first player to score a hat trick of tries in a World Club Challenge.
2015–2017: World Club Series In September 2014, it was announced that the World Club Challenge name would be changed to the World Club Series with six clubs participating – 3 from each league. The first iteration took place between 20 and 22 February 2015, and featured three matches, the first and second essentially being two exhibition games and the final game being for the Championship trophy between the two respective premiers as in previous years. In 2017, the format was reduced to four teams, with the NRL citing tight schedules, distant travel and long seasons as an impediment to their participation in the Series. After the NRL negotiated with the Brisbane Broncos, it was decided that they would represent the NRL in an exhibition match vs
Warrington Wolves prior to the usual Challenge game between the Super League Champions
Wigan Warriors and
Cronulla Sutherland Sharks, maintaining the overall Series concept. 2017 would be Super League's first victory since the series began, with Warrington winning 27–18 against Brisbane, and Wigan beating Cronulla 22–6. In October 2017, it was suggested that the 2018 Series could be scrapped completely based on the top Australian teams reluctance to travel to the UK for the 2017 series which resulted in the Series being scaled back to two games only. In particular the second game of the 2017 series only featured an invited team from the NRL. In addition, the
2017 Rugby League World Cup being played in Australia at the end of 2017, meant that the preseasons for Australian teams was going to be unusually short ahead of the 2018 season and therefore did not want to make the trip to England for the 2018 series. The
Melbourne Storm (2017 NRL Premiers) in particular, were reluctant to travel meaning the series was in danger of cancellation for the first time since the 1990s as it is the Storm that was playing in the World Club Challenge. In June 2017, the
Super League announced that the Australian city of
Wollongong would host the first ever
Super League game outside Europe.
Wigan Warriors will "host"
Hull F.C. in the game at
WIN Stadium on Saturday, 10 February. In addition and as part of this trip to Australia, Wigan and Hull would also play two exhibition games against
South Sydney Rabbitohs and
St George Illawarra Dragons respectively. These were separately arranged fixtures and not considered part of the World Club Series.
2018–2020: Return to single match format 's
Cameron Smith with the trophy following the club's
2018 victory On 14 November 2017, it was confirmed that
Leeds Rhinos would travel to Australia to play Melbourne Storm at
AAMI Park in
Melbourne on 16 February 2018, and that the World Club Challenge would return to a one-game format for the first time since 2014. On 22 February 2020, the
Sydney Roosters became the first team to win back to back World Club Challenges, defeating
St Helens 20–12 in the process. They also overtook
Wigan in most challenges won with five.
2021–2022: COVID-19 cancellations On 20 November 2020 it was announced that the 2021 World Club challenge, which was due to be played between
Melbourne Storm and
St Helens would be postponed until late in 2021 owing to the push back of seasons due to the
COVID-19 pandemic and the ongoing pandemic itself preventing overseas travel. However, due to the continuing issues surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, the clash between St Helens and Melbourne was completely cancelled. In October 2021, St Helens chairman Eamonn McManus said that while he hoped the 2022 version of this fixture could go ahead against the Penrith Panthers, he acknowledged it would be “very difficult” to arrange. In November 2021 Penrith Panthers CEO Brian Fletcher said Penrith would only play if the game was played at BlueBet Stadium the Panthers home ground at the time because they didn't want to send their team to play against St Helens in England. St Helens coach Kristian Woolfe agreed on the condition that Penrith pay for the fares of the St Helens team. Penrith refused and the match was cancelled for this reason. The year's competition was ultimately also cancelled.
2023–present: Return On 9 November 2022, it was announced that the World Club Challenge would make its return and be staged in Australia at
BlueBet Stadium. Back-to-back NRL champions Penrith Panthers would host St Helens, the Super League champions for four consecutive years. The match took place on Saturday February 18, with kick-off at 7am (GMT). For the first time in the history of the competition the match went to
golden point extra time after a dramatic finale meant that the match was tied 12–12 at the full time hooter. St Helens scored the winning point with a
Lewis Dodd drop goal, a shock win to become the first Super League side to win the Challenge in Australia since 1994. This was also the worst attended game in 23 years, falling nearly 10,000 short of the capacity of the
BlueBet Stadium, the previous low attendance also involved St Helens which was held at the
DW Stadium in Wigan, with only the 1997 game having a lower attendance. Penrith would win a third consecutive NRL title while St Helens' monopoly ended as
Wigan Warriors won
2023 Super League Grand Final to set up a rematch from the
1991 World Club Challenge. Penrith would again fail in capturing an inaugural World Club Challenge win in
2024 as they were defeated 16-12 at a sellout
DW Stadium with 24,091 in attendance. By Winning, Wigan set a record equalling tally of five World Club Challenge wins along with
Sydney Roosters. Ahead of the
2024 NRL Grand Final, reports began circulating that the
2025 World Club Challenge was at risk of cancellation as teams that could potentially qualify (
Penrith Panthers,
Warrington Wolves, and
Wigan Warriors) would have difficulty arranging travel to either the UK or Australia, then to the United States, with the usual date of the tournament being close to that of the 2025
Rugby League Las Vegas event. On 9th October 2024,
2024 NRL Grand Final champions
Penrith Panthers confirmed to the
NRL that they would not play the match before the start of the domestic seasons citing player welfare as the issue stating that their players were delaying their mandated leave to play in the
2024 Rugby League Pacific Championships and
2024 Samoa rugby league tour of England thus not allowing players to have an adequate preseason before the World Club Challenge. The club stated that it was open to working with the NRL for a solution to play the match, but would not play the match as things currently stand stood.
2024 Super League Grand Final champions
Wigan Warriors were commitment to the fixture. The match was never played. after winning the
2026 World Club Challenge After the 2025
Rugby League Las Vegas event was held, talks emerged in regards to the World Club Challenge being played at Vegas the following year; however, this did not come to fruition. The following month, Rhodri Jones, CEO of Rugby League Commercial, stated both
Super League and the
NRL had committed to staging the event in 2026. Following
Brisbane Broncos's victory in the
2025 NRL Grand Final, NRL CEO
Andrew Abdo confirmed the staging of the 2026 event with details to be worked out following the result of the
2025 Super League Grand Final. Following
Hull Kingston Rovers's victory in the Super League Grand Final, talks emerged that the
2026 World Club Challenge had been penciled in for 21 February with Brisbane travelling to
Hull FC's
MKM Stadium for the game. The game was later confirmed for 19 February. ==Results==