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RL World Club Series may be headed to Oz

The World Club Series could be played in Australia from 2018, along with the opening game of the Super League season.

3 min read

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Source: AAP


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The series has been cut to just two matches this year after Brisbane were the only club to accept an invitation to join NRL champions Cronulla and the Australian duo will play Warrington and Wigan respectively this weekend.

Wigan chairman Ian Lenagan told a news conference at Orrell his club were close to playing the 2017 World Club Challenge - the centre-piece of the series - in Australia and had also raised the possibility of kicking off the Super League campaign against Warrington Down Under.

"I think it would be great for Super League and for rugby league generally to play the series in Australia," Lenagan said.

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"We proved it with Wigan against the Roosters in Sydney three years ago by getting 35,000 people there that there is an appetite and the more we can open eyes, to the Australians in particular, to the international club arrangement, the better. If that means we go to them, then we go to them.

"We are, as always, in discussions 12 months in advance, about what happens in February 2018. We came very close indeed to playing this game in Australia this year."

Warrington coach Tony Smith, who has taken his club to Sydney for pre-season training camps in the past, had given his backing to playing this year's series Down Under.

"We were certainly up for it. That is the ultimate test. We'd like to go there as Super League champions and play for the title but we'd do it any way. I think there's scope for it if it was put on in the right places, the rugby league cities."

Lenagan, one of the men behind the move to expand the World Club Challenge, says he does not blame the NRL clubs for their lack of enthusiasm, arguing that it is up to the Super League clubs to make the series more attractive by posting victories.

"I think we have to win to earn the right to play more games," Lenagan said. "The fact we've lost six in a row is our fault, not the NRL's fault.

"What's the point in expanding something that's not been successful?

"I think the pull of the big teams in Australia is very strong but we've got to win first and that's Wigan's objective for Sunday. We take on a mantle that is very important for Super League."


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