Sourcing caveat: No referee could be confirmed for this final. A second-pass search (Aug 2026) used individual Wikipedia biographies to add two Widnes (team1) players — Jimmy Hoey, whose page confirms he played in this final but describes his general club-era role ambiguously as 'a goal-kicking centre, or second-row forward' rather than pinning down his position for this specific match, and George van Rooyen, whose page confirms this final without a match-specific position but separately states his rugby league position throughout his career was second-row — and one St Helens (team2) player, prop Lou Houghton, who is also explicitly credited with a try (added to team2_tries below, though this alone does not account for the full 3-point St Helens score, and no other scorers for either side could be confirmed). No squad numbers are given since numbered shirts were not yet standard practice in this period.
Scorers
Widnes
No scorers recorded.
St Helens
Tries: Lou Houghton
Teams
Widnes
St Helens
Jimmy Hoey
Centre or second-row (exact position for this match unconfirmed)
Lou Houghton
Match officials
Referee
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Match report
Widnes beat St Helens 10-3 at Wembley to win the Challenge Cup in their first-ever final appearance, the second final staged at the new Wembley venue. The attendance of 36,544 was down slightly on the inaugural Wembley final the year before, but the occasion still represented a major milestone for Widnes as a club. St Helens had reached the final by beating Wigan in their semi-final, itself settled only after an initial 5-5 draw and replay. The Rugby League Challenge Cup is rugby league's oldest and most prestigious knockout competition, first contested in 1896/97 under what was then the Northern Union. Its history has been interrupted only by the two World Wars, with four editions lost between 1915/16 and 1918/19 and one more in 1939/40; the finals played either side of those gaps, and during the Second World War itself, were sometimes contested as regional or two-legged fixtures under wartime emergency arrangements rather than the usual single showpiece match. For much of the competition's early history the final rotated around northern club and representative grounds such as Headingley, Fartown, Central Park and the Athletic Ground, Rochdale, before Wembley Stadium became the final's permanent home from 1928/29 onward (with a short break during Wembley's 2000-2007 reconstruction, when finals were staged at Murrayfield, Twickenham and the Millennium Stadium instead). Since 1946/47, the competition's individual award, the Lance Todd Trophy, has been presented to the final's outstanding player, voted for by a panel of media representatives at the final whistle — on several notable occasions the trophy has gone to a player on the losing side, an unusual honour that reflects the award's focus on individual performance rather than simply reflecting the final scoreline. This was the 30th Challenge Cup final played, and, under the name “Widnes,” the 1st Challenge Cup title for the club.
Early rounds feature amateur and community clubs alongside professional ones; team names are linked only where this site has a team page for that exact club, matching the same safety-first approach used for the Final's own results table.
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