That Was the Year That Was

Cast your mind back to Friday 26th March 2021. It was just under nine months ago and the Super League season was due to begin. The start was delayed from early February to mid March due to the covid-ravaged 2020 season, which only concluded in late November.

Whilst we had all hoped that normal life would have returned by 2021, a national lockdown announced just four days into the New Year was a stark reminder that normality remained a long way away. On 14th January, reflecting the dire situation, the season start date was put back to late March.

St Helens and Salford kicked off the season on neutral turf at Headingley before empty terraces once again. 25 years earlier, almost to the day, the first ever Super League match was played in Paris before a crowd of over 17,000. At times, it felt as though such occasions would never return.

Turning to the on field action and in the early days of the season the Super League table had a very familiar look. Just like in 2018, 2019 and 2020, St Helens and Wigan occupied places 1 and 2 on the league ladder. By the late May, both sides remained unbeaten. They may not have been blowing sides away but there was a feeling of de ja vu.

Two Weeks in May

May proved a pivotal time both on and off the field. Starting with off it, on Monday 17th May, Government restrictions in England eased somewhat and crowds capped at 4,000 were allowed in stadiums once again. Smartly, Super League took advantage and scheduled five matches for that evening. Perhaps surprisingly, four out of five matches were won by the away side, including eye catching wins for Hull KR at Castleford, Huddersfield at Warrington and Catalans at Hull FC. Home advantage wasn't all it was cracked up to be.

This was seen as a pivotal time of the season for Catalans, as their away win at Hull FC was followed by St Helens and Wigan in consecutive weeks at home. Catalans had their injuries, but still impressively beat St Helens before thumping Wigan 48-0. We may not have thought it at the time but a new force was emerging in Super League.

'Pingdemic'

As July 2021 came around, covid cases started to rise sharply. The rule at the time was that, if you were a close contact of a covid positive individual, you must self-isolate. This wreaked havoc on Super League and caused the cancellation of 15 matches.

It is easy to forget now but there were genuine concerns as to whether the Super League season was going to be able to conclude. A problem now facing sports that take place primarily during the winter, with the emergence of a new, more-transmissible variant.

A combination of covid case rates plummeting around the time that Government restrictions were fully removed in late July and a change meaning that vaccinated individuals who were close contacts of covid positive people no longer had to isolate came at a beneficial time.

Arguably the greater fear came for the Challenge Cup Final, due to be held in mid-July 2021. What if Castleford or St Helens faced a covid outbreak? The final would be ruined! Thankfully, this did not happen and 40,000 fans returned to Wembley to witness a tense final. Castleford played with their characteristic flair, rattled St Helens, and led 12-6 at half time. St Helens were far more composed in the second half and their class told. The club ran out winners in the end, lifting their first Challenge Cup since 2008. This was the second Challenge Cup success of the year for the Saints, whose women's team defeated York one month earlier.

Although the Challenge Cup Final was unaffected by covid, the 1895 Cup Final was touch and go. It was only on the day of the match, as Featherstone and York fans were on their way down the M1, that confirmation was received that the game would go ahead! In the boiling conditions at Wembley, both sides played out a high-scoring thriller, with a late York comeback being in vein, with Featherstone deserved winners by 37-30.

The sport's authorities were wiping away a drop of sweat from their brows, the two finals had gone ahead without disruption. Little did they know that five days later, Australia and New Zealand were to withdraw from the Rugby League World Cup in 2021. Our sport once again made the back pages for the wrong reasons, with a war of words erupting. NRL Chief Peter V'Landys managed to take the crown for the most ridiculous comment, (quite the effort to usurp Phil Gould). Taking umbrage at criticism of Australia, he claimed that the English still thought of Australia as a 'penal colony'.

It is credit to the team organising the World Cup that it will now go ahead in 2022, with most sponsorship deals, Government funding and TV deals rolled over. We will probably never appreciate how difficult of a feat this was.

Business End

By August 2021, we reached the business end of the season. Leigh secured two late season wins to avoid the ignominy of being the only Super League side to lose every game in a season. Such was their plight, relegation was confirmed in August and hardly anybody noticed. It had been a foregone conclusion for several months.

What was far from a foregone conclusion was the race for the play offs and League Leaders Shield. Wigan hit a rough spell of form over summer and, for a brief period, looked in danger of being dragged into a battle for their play off spot. Some wins, albeit unconvincing ones, ended that fear. The pressure on Adrian Lam did not end and his contract was not renewed for 2022.

The Magic Weekend was in the final month of the season for the first time. And it led to some wonderful drama. Castleford won the opening match against Salford to keep their play off hopes alive. Leeds and Hull FC played out a thriller, a game that went back and forth, before a Kruise Leeming golden point drop goal ended Hull FC's season.

Arguably the game of the season was sandwiched in the middle, with Catalans playing St Helens, with the former securing their first League Leaders Shield courtesy of a dramatic victory. St Helens were excellent for 75 minutes but fell victim to a Catalans ambush, with three tries in five minutes turning a 30-12 scoreline into a 30-30 match heading to golden point. It was James Maloney who stepped up to win the match and Catalan's maiden minor premiership.

The race for the play off spots went to the final day, with one of Castleford, Hull KR and Leeds set to miss out. Hull KR defeated Castleford in the penultimate round which set up a do-or die clash for the Tigers against Warrington on the final day. In Daryl Powell's final game, Castleford collapsed and the game was in effect over half time, despite a reasonably impressive second half comeback. The loss for Castleford confirmed Leeds' and Hull KR's play off places.

With Super League's organisers deciding not to have Castleford's match against Warrington and Leeds' clash against Hull KR kicking off at the same time, the potential drama that should be associated with the last round of fixtures was ruined. Take note for 2022, Super League.

Trophy Time

Once again, Super League had a top 6 play off system for 2021, which saw two elimination matches preceding the semi finals. Unusually, the two lowest ranking sides won those matches, with Leeds edging past a toothless and inept Wigan and Hull KR breezing past an equally as unimpressive Warrington, the latter crashing out at the first hurdle for a third consecutive season.

This left us with two semi finals where the home sides, Catalans and St Helens, were overwhelming favourites. That tag was proven justified as Catalans reached their first ever Grand Final in front of a sold out Stade Gilbert Brutus and St Helens reached their 14th Grand Final by defeating Leeds.

This left two deserved Grand Finalists, who served up an intense and high quality encounter. Both sides were pushed to their limits, including two Catalans players who played almost the whole match with fractures to the hand. Ultimately, it was St Helens' clinical nature, and two Kevin Naiqama tries that secured the 'three-peat' for St Helens. As the dust settled on another season, the question begged, who can stop them in 2022?

Meanwhile, in the Championship, glory went to Toulouse. After previous false dawns, they sparkled rather than faded when the play offs hit, maintained their 100% record and secured promotion by defeating Featherstone, who just could not overcome that final hurdle once again. With Leigh's relegation, 2022 promises to be a thrilling year in the Championship, with the Centurions and the Rovers being promotion favourites.

League 1 contains a lot of expansion clubs, but in 2021, it was all about the heartlands. Barrow and Workington battled hard for the automatic promotion place. Barrow won a game in the dying minutes away at Rochdale to keep pole position and finished the job with a demolition of West Wales, in a dramatic end to the season. The disappointment for Workington was short-lived, as they successfully navigated the play off series, defeating Doncaster in the play off final, leading to wild celebrations from over 3,000 fans at Derwent Park.

With Whitehaven making the Championship play offs courtesy of a late-season surge, pulling themselves away from a relegation battle in the process, all three Cumbrian sides will be in the second tier next year. 2021 was an excellent year for the county.

And Finally...

With the World Cup postponed until 2022 and covid still an unwelcome presence in our lives, internationals were very limited this year. England took part in a mid-season challenge against the Combined Nations All Stars, and were defeated. This was a revival of the 'Exiles' concept and will be a key part of our preparations for next year's World Cup.

In the post-season international, England comfortably defeated France. The game was de facto over after 20 minutes courtesy of a four-try blitz. France fought back bravely to keep the scoreline respectable in the second half. Hopefully there is much more to talk about in an international sense next year and it is the highlight of the season, rather than an afterthought.

And that was 2021! Another weird and wonderful year in this sport. Here's to another 12 months of the same to come!

Whilst you're here...take a look at this page for links to all 40 of our blogposts published throughout the 2021 season!