Only two league points separated St Helens and the Catalans Dragons coming into tonight’s clash at the Totally Wicked Stadium with the visitors knowing that a win would lift them level on points with the league leaders, and an improbably large win, by sixty-one points or more, would see them to the top of table on points difference.

Saints were given a ten-point handicap on the coupon which lent some credibility to a bounce back Dragons win after their home defeat at the hands of the Warrington Wolves last weekend.

The league leaders were without the inspirational Jonny Lomax who is out with a hand injury and who was replaced by Moses Mbye at stand-off allowing new stand in skipper Jack Welsby to remain at full back.

A win by a margin of twenty-six points or more would move Wigan Warriors to the top of the table with a game in hand, all that stood in their way was the unpredictable Salford Red Devils who have the chutzpah to beat anyone on their day.

Salford needed the win to maintain their push for the top of the table and to ensure that they spend more time in the top six, defying critics and pundits alike as they continue to make the most out of a small budget and ever smaller playing staff.

Wigan were the favourites for the win with a ten point handicap on the coupon, Salford the clear underdogs, a position that they thrive on.

Still on cloud nine after securing their place in the Challenge Cup final, Warrington Wolves made the trip to the south of France to take on a Catalans Dragons side with the chance to join St Helens at the top of the table the spoils for the victor.

It wasn´t an easy game to call, the bookies giving Warrington a four-point start on the handicap coupon, the normal weighting in favour of the home side due to their home advantage.

Coach Burgess kept the same starting seventeen that beat the Giants in the cup last weekend, Steve McNamara had Theo Fages back in the side in place of Jayden Nikorima who was moved to the bench, but McIlorum and McMeeken were missing from the squad with injuries.

A round twelve encounter between joint league leaders, St Helens, and seventh placed Leeds Rhinos was likely to be a one-sided affair with the bookies giving the Rhinos a fourteen-point start on the coupon despite the Rhinos having Brodie Croft and Harry Newman back in their starting line-up along with on-loan Matty Russell.

Saints would end the night two points clear of the chasing pack of they were to pick up the win, the Rhinos could lift themselves into the top half of the table if they were to grab an unlikely win over the old enemy, something that they haven’t managed since a one-point win in March 2023.

Pre-game there was pessimism amongst the Rhinos fans, expectation amongst those supporting Saints.

When it comes to Women’s Super League it doesn’t get any bigger than a clash between St Helens and the Leeds Rhinos, the top two sides in the game with league leaderships, championships and challenge cup wins between them and a dress rehearsal for next months Challenge Cup Final at Wembley.

Old rivalries were renewed in a match which the bookies struggled to find a favourite, edging towards the home side based on their home advantage.

The game was a curtain raiser for the men’s Super League game to be played this evening but there was every chance that this would be a more thrilling, exciting, and closer match than the one kicking off at eight o’clock.

The RFL and Rugby League Commercial have confirmed that Martin Offiah MBE has accepted an invitation to be Chief Guest at the 2024 Betfred Challenge Cup Finals Day – 30 years since he scored probably the most celebrated try in the long history of Rugby League being played at Wembley Stadium.

Offiah played in four consecutive Wembley Finals for Wigan from 1992-95, in which he scored a total of four tries - including the length of the field spectacular against Leeds in 1994, when he was awarded the Lance Todd Trophy as player of the match.

That try earned him a place on the Rugby League Statue alongside four other greats of the sport which was installed at Wembley in 2015, captured in the celebration of his try which has become equally famous, on his knees with his head in his hands in an instant reflection of the moment.

Huddersfield Giants were looking for a repeat of their Challenge Cup 2022 final appearance, they faced the tough proposition of a game against a Warrington Wolves side who lifted the trophy on their last appearance in a final back in 2019.

The bookies had made Warrington slight favourites for the win and to set up a Wembley final against the Wigan Warriors on the 8th June as they gave Huddersfield a six point start on the handicap coupon.

This was the sides first meeting of the season, Huddersfield trailing their opponents by six points in the league table, all likelihood was that this would be the Wolves afternoon in the sunshine in St Helens.

A place at Wembley on the 8th June, to take on cup holders St Helens, awaited the winners of a mouthwatering encounter between the Leeds Rhinos and Wigan Warriors as the second Challenge Cup semi-final took place at the Totally Wicked Stadium in St Helens.

It couldn’t be closer in the league with both sides currently unbeaten after three rounds of the Women’s 2024 Super League and sat in equal top place and just a small separation in achieved points difference.

Leeds have been the defeated finalists in the last two seasons after back-to-back wins in 2018 and 2019, while the Cherry & Whites have never made it to a Challenge Cup Final, eighty minutes would lead to elation and heartbreak, but few would be brave enough to call the outcome before the kick-off.

Last years defeated finalists, Hull Kingston Rovers, were looking for a return to Wembley as they faced cup kings and twenty times winners, Wigan Warriors, in the first semi-final in Doncaster.

Hull KR won the 2024 meeting between the two sides at the end of April by a convincing 26-10 scoreline and the Robins came into the game determined to repeat last year’s feat of making it to the final and hopefully going one better than last season.

Wigan were the favourites with the bookies, KR being given an eight-point start on the handicap coupon, the odds perhaps being set based on last week’s Super League results.

 

The first of the weekend’s four Challenge Cup semi-finals got underway on Saturday lunchtime as York Valkyrie took on the holders, St Helens, at the Eco-Power Stadium in Doncaster in a game which the bookies couldn’t decide on a favourite.

The York side had illness in the camp with several of their star players missing as they cobbled together a side to match the side who have lifted the Women’s Challenge Cup for the last three seasons.

York were victorious in the league meeting between the two sides in round one when they recorded a 20-16 win in a close game, on paper it really was too close to call.

Katherine Jenkins OBE, the biggest selling classical artist of the 21st Century, will sing the National Anthem at Rugby League’s Finals Day at Wembley Stadium on Saturday 8 June.

The Welsh mezzo-soprano will perform before the finals of both the Men’s and Women’s Betfred Challenge Cup, and will also sing Rugby League’s traditional Wembley hymn, Abide With Me, ahead of the Men’s final which kicks off at 3pm.

Neath-born Katherine is cherished as one of Britain’s most acclaimed singers and is one of the world’s most prolific artists in UK Classical chart history.

She officially confirmed her position as the world’s most successful classical singer after she was crowned ‘The Biggest Selling Classical Artist of the Century’ by Classic FM.

It wasn’t a question of who would win the basement encounter between the London Broncos and Hull FC, it was more a question of how many Hull FC would win by as any notion of defeat for the Black and Whites was simply unthinkable.

The bookies were confident in a win for the away side, giving the Broncos a twelve-point start on the coupon, the Airlie Birds only win in 2024 was the last ditch 28-24 victory over todays opponents when the sides met back at the beginning of March.

FC were undefeated in their last twelve meetings with the London side, a stretch meaning that the Broncos moniker has never defeated a Hull FC side.

London simply didn't stand a chance.

 

The Rhinos filled their boots last week against the London Broncos but round eleven saw them with a daunting trip to the south of France to take on a Catalans Dragons side who were looking for the win to rejoin a cluster of clubs at the top of the table on sixteen league points.

A win for Leeds would lift them into the top six, but a big win could see them go ahead of the Dragons and as high as fourth in the table, but the bookies were favouring a home win, giving the visitors a fourteen-point start on the coupon.

Could the Rhinos make it three wins on the trot to find some sort of consistency or would it be the Dragons who would take their second win in their last five outings after a disappointing couple of rounds.

A win by thirty-eight points or more would move the Wigan Warriors into top spot in the table with a game in hand, all that stood in their way at the John Smith’s Stadium was a Huddersfield Giants side who had still not managed to fire on all cylinders and were bubbling just outside the play-off places.

Wigan were the favourites with the bookies to repeat their victory from early March when they beat the Giants by 30-16 at the DW Stadium, but there was little to choose between the sides with just a four-point start for the home side on the coupon.

It was a cracking afternoon for a fast and open game in the early summer sunshine, twenty-minute water breaks agreed between the sides.

It’s just eleven miles between the home stadia of the Leigh Leopards and Salford Red Devils but a massive nine points on the Super League 2024 table as the home side look to build on the single point which they picked up in last weekend’s draw with the Castleford Tigers while Salford knew that a win would keep them joint top of a congested table.

The bookies had made the home side slight favourites for the win and handicapped them by six points on the coupon but the recent news of the departures of Asiata and Hardaker to Hull FC must have caused some disquiet in the ranks.

Salford won the encounter between the two sides in March by 36-24 but despite the gulf in table points, this was likely to be a close encounter.

It was a tasty looking game to open round eleven of Super League 2024 as two of the six sides sharing the top of the table met at the Halliwell Jones Stadium as the second placed Warrington Wolves took on a buoyant Hull Kingston Rovers side who began the night in fourth spot.

One of these sides would be two points clear at the end of eighty minutes while depending on results elsewhere in the round, the other could conceivably drop outside the top six and the all-important play-off places.

Warrington were the slight favourites with the bookies, handicapped four points on the coupon, but there would be no underestimating a Hull KR side which has shocked pundits and delighted their home support with a fantastic start to the season and who ran them very close when the two sides met in March.

Third placed Widnes Vikings were hoping for a large points win over a mid-table Doncaster side as they met in a round seven encounter for which the bookies had made the home side clear favourites with a fourteen point handicap on the coupon.

Both sides came into the game on the back on wins last weekend, Widnes scraping past the Bradford Bulls by a single point but Doncaster with a much more confident win over the league bottom club Dewsbury.

A thirty-six-point victory would put Widnes second, depending on the afternoons other scores a big win could put Doncaster as high as fifth.

Two sides from the wrong end if the 2024 Super League table met in the final game of round ten as the Castleford Tigers went to Leigh Leopards with both sides looking for their third win of the season to cut adrift the pointless London Broncos in last place.

The bookies couldn’t see anything other than a win for the Leopards, giving the visitors a sixteen-point start in the coupon for the first meeting between the two strugglers, mostly in recognition of the way that Leigh demolished the Catalans Dragons last time out just eight days ago.

If Round Ten of Super League had a ‘home banker’ then it must be the home game for the Leeds Rhinos against a London Broncos side who have been unable to register a win all season and who are currently shipping in average in excess of thirty-eight points a game while scoring less than ten.

A big win for the Rhinos could see them into the top half of the table and would serve as some respite for their coach under fire, Rohan Smith, and the bookies were giving the visitors a twenty-eight-point start on the handicap coupon.

Should London grab a win, against all the odds, then the end of the evening could see them in eleventh place in the table should Hull FC sustain a heavy loss against the Warrington Wolves.

Arguably the game of the round was first up on the Thursday night of round ten of SuperLeague 2024 as the Catalans Dragons visited the Wigan Warriors with the top of the table in the sights of both teams as the competition enters it’s middle third of the season.

It was a repeat of the 2023 Grand Final with the Dragons looking to do better than the 10-2 defeat which they suffered at Old Trafford last October, but the bookies had the home side down as favourites by handicapping them twelve points on the coupon before kick-off.

A win of any description would send the Dragons to the top, a win by more than twenty-four points would put the Warriors at the peak of the table.