Wigan Warriors mustered an inspired defensive effort to beat rivals St Helens 32-0 and book a return to Wembley Stadium in the Betfred Challenge Cup final later this month.
At Warrington, Matt Peat’s side strongly shook off their recent Super League struggles to win, with Jack Farrimond and Zach Eckersley scoring twice each to damage the scoreboard.
However, this result only told half the story, as the record 21-time winners were forced to fight off waves of Saints attacks before seizing the moment in clinical fashion.
Wigan will be looking to win the Challenge Cup for the third time in five seasons and will face either Warrington Wolves or Hull KR in the final on May 30th.
Wigan beat Saints to secure return to Wembley
Saints, aiming to reach their first final since 2021, have won their last five games in all competitions, including a dramatic success on Good Friday against struggling opponents, and should have gone in as favorites.
Paul Rowley’s side dominated early field position despite losing Matty Rees to a knee injury in the first minute, but will be punished mercilessly for failing to make that advantage count.
Wigan took the lead with their first real attack after a moment of brilliance from Brad O’Neill. Hooker stepped forward, shrugged off two Saints tackles and played a brilliant one-two with Jay Field before Farimond opened the scoring.
Farrimond scores two tries for Wigan in an impressive victory.
Adam Keiran took the penalty kick, but Saints kept up the pressure and fought back. Lewis Murphy was once again guilty of wasting an opportunity, with Jackson Hastings denied by a disorganized Wigan defense at the tryline.
Wigan improved in the final ten minutes of the second half. A deft kick from Farrimond was saved by Keiglan, and Eckersley pounced on the loose ball to bring his team to double digits.
After some great work from Farrimond, Eckersley scored his second goal with an acrobatic finish into the corner. A floated pass to Keiglan created space for his teammate to send the winger out.
Wigan last won the Challenge Cup in 2024.
Saints’ first-half misery ended with Jake Wardle intercepting a short pass from Joe Shorrocks to cheers and score Wigan’s fourth goal, just before Harry Smith put Saints up 22-0.
Saints regained their momentum after the break and increased the pressure after Smith’s knock-on, but despite deploying their battering ram they were unable to find any innovation to break through Wigan’s resolute defence.
Alex Walmsley, Deon Cross and Jack Welsby all came within inches but to no avail, and Saints’ frustration began to grow as time wore on, with Welsby sin-binned with 15 points remaining for interference in a ruck.
Inevitably tempers began to fluctuate towards the end, but Wigan remained admirably resolute and slowly dashed their opponents’ hopes of getting back into the game.
Fittingly, the scoreless second period was broken in the 75th minute when the outstanding Farrimond darted out to score Wigan’s fifth goal and Smith’s superb kick sent Keiglan flying away to smother the heckler and seal the win.
Pete ‘felt’ Wigan’s victory was coming
Wigan Warriors head coach Matt Peat said:
“When I woke up this morning, I felt more confident than I have in years.
“It was great to really want to stick together for each other and get the job done and make that extra effort. You could feel it just by the smell of where we were leading up to it, where we had our players and where we brought some of our players back.”
“We knew this was one of the days we had to step it up.”
St Helens head coach Paul Lawrie:
“It’s disappointing because obviously we wanted to be in the cup final. But they had some really big moments from start to finish – most of the big moments were them, to be honest.”
“What we learned in this game is that you can change things and score a lot of points in a short amount of time. We started the second half well and dominated, but we couldn’t score any points.
“You’ll be disappointed when you look back at the tries you conceded, but you’ll be disappointed in the fact that we didn’t put ourselves in perspective at the right time and with enough excitement and energy.”
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St Helens previously had a dramatic derby win against Wigan on Good Friday
What’s next?
The other semi-final will be played on Sunday, when Warrington Wolves take on defending champions Hull KR, just like in last year’s final (4pm kick-off). The final will be played at Wembley Stadium on May 30th.
St Helens return to Super League action on Thursday, taking on Huddersfield Giants, live on Sky Sports+ from 8pm. Wigan host Leeds Rhinos on Friday, live on Sky Sports Action and Sky Sports+ from 7.30pm.
Sky Sports will continue to broadcast every Super League match live this season. Exclusively live, including two matches from each round, the remaining five matches will be shown weekly on Sky Sports+.
