World Club Challenge: Penrith Panthers 12-13 St Helens – Super League champions stun NRL premiers

St Helens are the first Super League side to win the World Club Challenge since Wigan in 2017Penrith Panthers (0) 12Tries: Tago, To’o Goals: Cleary 2St Helens (10) 13Tries: Welsby, Hurrell Goals: Makinson, Percival Drop-goal: Dodd

St Helens upset National Rugby League champions Penrith to become the first Super League side to win the World Club Challenge in Australia since 1994.

Lewis Dodd kicked the winning drop-goal in golden-point extra time after the Panthers fought back from 12-0 down.

Super League champions Saints led 10-0 at the break thanks to Jack Welsby’s try and a second from Konrad Hurrell.

Mark Percival added a penalty but Penrith hit back to level through Izack Tago and Brian To’o’s last-gasp score.

The last club to achieve such a feat down under was the all-conquering Wigan side featuring Jason Robinson, Martin Offiah and Denis Betts; back when league was a winter game, against Wayne Bennett’s star-packed Brisbane Broncos.

This was also Saints’ first win in the World Club Challenge since 2007, again against the Broncos at Bolton’s then Reebok Stadium.

Panthers struggle to match Saints intensityLewis Dodd, who missed St Helens’ Grand Final win over Leeds in September because of injury, kicked the match-winning drop-goal in the World Club Challenge

Any doubts that Saints, who have won Super League four years in a row, could transfer that domestic dominance to a global stage, particularly on away turf, proved utterly unfounded by the performance and result of this final encounter.

In a sense the scoreline failed to represent the control that Saints showed in large periods, forcing errors with their line speed and causing headaches at the other end in attack.

Their opponents Penrith had established their own superiority of the NRL with back-to-back Grand Final wins, and had a glut of world-class stars such as Nathan Cleary, Isaah Yeo and Jarome Luai within their ranks.

Yet St Helens started with an intensity that the Panthers struggled to match, wrapping an insatiable defensive zeal around a quick ruck-game that opened up space to attack.

Welsby was immense, scoring after the tireless James Roby and Jonny Lomax exploited one such ruck to put Curtis Sironen through a hole, and denying To’o a try at the other end.

Alex Walmsley and Matty Lees, assisted by Agnatius Paasi and Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook off the bench, continually churned out metres against a back-pedalling defence.

It was that go-forward which gave Hurrell the chance for his try out wide, a typical surge through, and left Penrith staring at a two-score deficit.

Thunder and lightning delayed the start of the second half, which continued in much the same vein, albeit Penrith started to show more fluidity after a clunky start.

It took until 10 minutes in that they finally breached the visitors, as Cleary’s kick bypassed Saints’ intense rushing defence to put Izack Tago in despite Welsby’s efforts.

Saints might have restored their buffer but for a Welsby pass to be ruled forward as Will Hopoate cruised into space out wide, while defensively they were again magnificent in scrambling to keep out full-back Stephen Crichton.

Both Lomax and Dodd both missed drop-goal shots to finish it in the 80 minutes as time ticked on, and it looked as though Welsby’s perfect night would be ruined in the final minute as his fumble from a hopeful ‘Hail Mary’ kick by Crichton gave To’o a free run to score.

However, the history-making Saints still had more to give and, after Crichton knocked-on inside his own half, they held their nerve with Dodd’s match-winning one-pointer edging a quite bruising and enthralling contest.

‘We came to show how good we are’ – reaction

St Helens matchwinner Lewis Dodd told ABC and BBC Radio 5 Sports Extra:

“They are the moments you dream of. I’m made up for the boys and the fans who have travelled all this way.

“The belief in the camp has always been there. We know how good we are and that’s all that matters. We came here to prove a point, win, lose or draw, to show how good we are and I think we did that.

“Penrith showed their class because at 12-0 down a lot of clubs would have crumbled, but Penrith are a really good side.

“You practice golden-point in training, it’s muscle memory and you do that for moments like that.”

St Helens’ Curtis Sironen told ABC and BBC 5 Live Sports Extra:

“We knew it was going to be a massive step up in class for us but we’re the sort of club that it doesn’t matter who we play – we turn up and play our own style.

“The Australian rugby league world will see what St Helens is all about now.

“It was unreal, we are World Club champions.”

Penrith Panthers: Crichton; May, Tago, Turuva, To’o; Luai, Cleary; Leota, Kenny, Fisher-Harris, Garner, Hosking, Yeo.

Interchanges: Cogger, Eisenhuth, Leniu, Salmon, Smith.

St Helens: Welsby; Makinson, Hurrell, Percival, Hopoate; Lomax, Dodd; Walmsley, Roby, Lees, Mata’utia, Sironen, Knowles.

Interchanges: Lussick, McCarthy-Scarsbrook, Paasi, Wingfield, Bell.