It started with a speculative email sent late at night almost a year ago but on Saturday evening, Kris Radlinski’s vision for Super League will become a reality live and in living colour in the bright lights of Las Vegas.
The Wigan Warriors CEO was at home, like so many others, watching the National Rugby League’s (NRL) inaugural venture into the United States at Allegiant Stadium just outside Las Vegas. His immediate thought: how does British rugby league muscle in on the opportunity? And so went the email that could potentially change the landscape of Super League for years to come: or at least, that is the tentative hope, anyway.
What was a two-game event last year has now doubled in size. On Saturday, two NRL fixtures – Canberra versus New Zealand Warriors and Penrith versus Canterbury – plus the first Super League game played in North America between Wigan and Warrington, as well as a women’s Test, will be played in front of over 50,000 supporters – many of them existing rugby league fans, but some of them new.
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It is rare for Super League and the NRL to work hand-in-hand like this, but there is a shared goal of collectively cracking the US sports market and exposing rugby league to the masses worldwide. Super League has tried to widen its net before, taking league fixtures to Camp Nou, Wollongong and even pushing the North American narrative with Canadian franchise Toronto Wolfpack.
All of that, ultimately, left little in the way of a legacy. So can Wigan versus Warrington in Las Vegas be different? Well, potentially: not least because the NRL’s marketing budgets and aggressive media-drive automatically make this bigger than anything Super League has attempted on its own.
“I’ve said before, this is the biggest game in Super League history, but I think I was wrong,” the Warrington CEO, Karl Fitzpatrick, said. “I think it’s actually the biggest game in British rugby league history, going back to 1895.” It is a bold claim, and the cynics would argue we’ve been here before and seen a sojourn into new territory serve as nothing more than a one-off.
But the very presence of the NRL makes this a big deal for British rugby league to start with. This is only year two of a five-year arrangement to take games to Las Vegas and with almost 10,000 Super League fans crossing the Atlantic this weekend, it seems certain that they will be invited back to the party next year, with clubs already queuing up to follow in Wigan and Warrington’s footsteps.
When we hear of executives talking about audience growth, we automatically assume the conversation revolves around new, overseas fans. But Australia – where league rules supreme – experienced a huge boom post-Vegas last year with supporters flocking to the NRL. Fitzpatrick is hopeful this weekend can produce something similar in England, where large parts of the country still have little no league presence.
“They’ve called it the halo effect back in Australia,” he explains. “The interest in the NRL surged in a way they didn’t think possible back home after last year’s Vegas games. All of Super League is promoting this because they know the benefits could be astronomical. This is unlike anything we’ve ever done. We’re going into the biggest sporting market on the planet, armed with the NRL’s finances.”
Sky Sports, as partners of Super League, are also buying in. They have invested huge sums to promote this and while stunts like inviting Michael Buffer to the season-opener between Wigan and Leigh, as well as constructing a Vegas-style wedding chapel outside Wigan’s ground, may seem tacky, they’re a sign that the broadcaster is interested. And interest means money, which can only be handy with a TV renewal looming.
Wigan have form for trying to be different. This venture will actually cost them money as they’re giving up a home game but their owner, Mike Danson, is willing to take the financial hit. This, they sense, is the chance to shake things up not just for the good of the Warriors, but the competition at a time when IMG are urging all clubs to think outside the box.
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“It’s an absolutely colossal moment for the sport in this country,” Radlinski explains. “We say that a lot, but Sky are investing money we’ve never seen before. We used to go to them with ideas; with Vegas, they’re coming to us. What it could do for everyone is something I didn’t appreciate when I first sent that email. This is not about us. We will all benefit from this. Success for me is two other clubs going next year.”
Super League and the NRL being aligned in Las Vegas this weekend and in the years ahead also has ripple effects. There is talk of the World Club Challenge, the meeting of the two major champions, being held there in 2026. Talk of the NRL buying Super League and taking it under its profitable and successful wing won’t go away: this, at a time when English clubs are threatening to oust the RFL chair, Simon Johnson, too.
Of course we’ve been here before: but not quite on this scale. British rugby league has never been armed so heavily with the tools with which to finally spread its wings.
