Sydney Roosters 20–12 St Helens — 2020 World Club Challenge
Totally Wicked Stadium, St Helens · Attendance: 16,108
Data last verified: 11 August 2026.
2020 World Club Challenge: Sydney Roosters 20–12 St Helens, at Totally Wicked Stadium, St Helens.
Scoring timeline
| 6′ | St Helens — try, Thompson |
| 12′ | Sydney Roosters — try, Tupou |
| 22′ | Sydney Roosters — try, Manu |
| 61′ | Sydney Roosters — try, Manu |
| 69′ | Sydney Roosters — try, Keary |
| 78′ | St Helens — try, Walmsley |
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
| Sydney Roosters | Tries: Tupou 12'; Manu 22'; Manu 61'; Keary 69' Goals: Taukeiaho (2/4 conversions) |
| St Helens | Tries: Thompson 6'; Walmsley 78' Goals: Makinson (2/2 conversions) |
Teams
| Sydney Roosters | St Helens | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | James Tedesco | Fullback | Jack Welsby | 1 |
| 2 | Daniel Tupou | Wing | Tommy Makinson | 2 |
| 3 | Angus Crichton | Centre | Kevin Naiqama | 3 |
| 4 | Joseph Manu | Centre | James Bentley | 4 |
| 5 | Brett Morris | Wing | Matthew Costello | 5 |
| 6 | Luke Keary | Five-eighth | Jonny Lomax | 6 |
| 7 | Kyle Flanagan | Halfback | Theo Fages | 7 |
| 8 | Jared Waerea-Hargreaves | Front row | Alex Walmsley | 8 |
| 9 | Jake Friend | Hooker (c) | James Roby | 9 |
| 10 | Siosiua Taukeiaho | Front row | Luke Thompson | 10 |
| 11 | Sitili Tupouniua | Second row | Zeb Taia | 11 |
| 12 | Mitchell Aubusson | Second row | Dominique Peyroux | 12 |
| 13 | Victor Radley | Lock | Morgan Knowles | 13 |
| Substitutes | ||||
| 14 | Sam Verrills | Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook | 14 | |
| 15 | Isaac Liu | Matty Lees | 15 | |
| 16 | Nat Butcher | Joseph Paulo | 16 | |
| 17 | Lindsay Collins | Aaron Smith | 17 | |
| Trent Robinson | Coach | Kristian Woolf | ||
Match officials
| Referee | Chris Kendall |
| Player of the match | Luke Keary (Sydney Roosters) |
Match report
The Roosters became the first side to win back-to-back World Club Challenges, extending their and Melbourne's shared dominance over Super League. St Helens started strongly, with Alex Walmsley and Luke Thompson's forward pack earning an early Thompson try, but the Roosters hit back through Tupou and Joey Manu to lead 8-6 at half-time. Saints pressed hard after the break, Tommy Makinson had a try controversially chalked off by video review, but Manu's second try and a spectacular long-range Luke Keary solo effort put the result beyond doubt. Walmsley's late score was consolation only. Coach Trent Robinson praised his side's physicality; St Helens' Kristian Woolf acknowledged his team "gave it a really good go" but lacked the finishing touch.This match belonged to the modern, annual World Club Challenge era, pitting that season's NRL Premiers directly against the same season's Super League Grand Final winners in a single fixture. 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 Sydney Roosters' 4th World Club Challenge title and the 28th staging of the fixture since its unofficial 1976 debut.