Wigan Warriors 21–4 Penrith Panthers — 1991 World Club Challenge
Anfield, Liverpool · Attendance: 20,152
Data last verified: 11 August 2026.
1991 World Club Challenge: Wigan Warriors 21–4 Penrith Panthers, at Anfield, Liverpool.
Sourcing caveat: Penrith's try-scorer surname is spelled both "Wills" and "Willis" across sources — "Wills" is used here as the more common spelling found.
Scoring timeline
| 18′ | Penrith Panthers — try, Wills |
| 27′ | Wigan Warriors — try, Panapa |
| 77′ | Wigan Warriors — try, Myers |
Tries with a sourced minute, in order scored. Tries whose exact minute isn't recorded in available sources appear in the Scorers table below but not here.
Scorers
| Wigan Warriors | Tries: Panapa 27'; Myers 77' Goals: Botica (6 goals) Drop goals: Lydon |
| Penrith Panthers | Tries: Wills 18' |
Teams
| Wigan Warriors | Penrith Panthers | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Steve Hampson | Fullback | Greg Barwick | 1 |
| 2 | David Myers | Wing | Graham Mackay | 2 |
| 3 | Sam Panapa | Centre | Graeme Bradley | 3 |
| 4 | Joe Lydon | Centre | Brad Izzard | 4 |
| 5 | Frano Botica | Wing | Darren Willis | 5 |
| 6 | Shaun Edwards | Five-eighth | Steve Carter | 6 |
| 7 | Andy Gregory (c) | Halfback | Greg Alexander (c) | 7 |
| 8 | Kelvin Skerrett | Front row | Brandon Lee | 8 |
| 9 | Martin Dermott | Hooker | Royce Simmons (c) | 9 |
| 10 | Andy Platt | Front row | Paul Dunn | 10 |
| 11 | Denis Betts | Second row | Paul Clarke | 11 |
| 12 | Billy McGinty | Second row | John Cartwright | 12 |
| 13 | Phil Clarke | Lock | Colin Van Der Voort | 13 |
| Substitutes | ||||
| 14 | Neil Cowie | Ben Alexander | 14 | |
| 15 | Ian Gildart | Grant Izzard | 15 | |
| 16 | Ian Lucas | Paul Smith | 16 | |
| 17 | Mike Forshaw | Anthony Xuereb | 17 | |
| John Monie | Coach | Phil Gould | ||
Match officials
| Referee | Alain Sablayrolles (France) |
| Player of the match | Frano Botica (Wigan) |
Match report
Played at Anfield rather than Wigan's own Central Park, this was a Wigan-dominated contest from the outset. Frano Botica landed four early penalty goals to open an 8-0 lead inside 13 minutes; Penrith's only response came through a Darren Wills try, and they never threatened again. Wigan extended their lead to 14-4 by half-time via Sam Panapa's converted try, then added a further Botica penalty and a late David Myers try, with Joe Lydon's field goal rounding out the scoring. Botica's man-of-the-match kicking display was the difference, continuing Wigan's dominant run in the fixture during their early-1990s peak.This match came from the fixture's early, sporadically-staged years, well before it settled into a genuinely annual format. The fixture as a whole began as a single unofficial match in 1976 and was repeated only sporadically through the 1980s and early 1990s: it wasn't played at all in 1988, 1990, 1993, or 1995-96, the last of those gaps caused by the Super League War splitting Australian rugby league into two rival competitions. The 1997 attempt to relaunch it as a 22-club, two-conference "World Club Championship" — five Australasian clubs touring Europe and five European clubs touring Australasia simultaneously — reportedly lost more than $5 million and was shelved for three years. It returned in 2000 as the simple one-off match still used today, missing only during the brief 2015-2017 multi-match "World Club Series" expansion (when the marquee fixture still determined the World Club Challenge title, alongside several other NRL-Super League pairings played the same week) and the 2021-2022 Covid-19 cancellations and the 2025 withdrawal by Penrith Panthers. The result here was Wigan Warriors' 2nd World Club Challenge title and the 4th staging of the fixture since its unofficial 1976 debut.