Hull KR

Every word Hull KR boss Willie Peters said on Mikey Lewis, the controversial grounding, Jamie Peacock impact and Micky McIlorum

by
Will Jackson
June 7, 2025

Hull KR beat Warrington Wolves 8-6 at Wembley Stadium to get their hands on the Challenge Cup for just the second time in their history.

Here’s what Robins head coach Willie Peters had to say when he sat down in front of the press after the game.

Willie, can you try and sum up your emotions?

It’s a weird feeling, I haven’t experienced it before. I’m so, so proud of this playing group. Unbelievable. That wasn’t the best performance but it was a gritty one. That’s what you need in a cup final, you need to have grit and you need to enjoy discomfort and we spoke about that last night. They were uncomfortable for long periods and Warrington just kept throwing so much at them and they kept defending.
Marc Sneyd was exceptional today but we found a way and I’m so proud of this playing group and the staff and really proud to be head coach of this club.

What did you make of the try and the grounding?

Yeah, I thought it was a try.

There was some controversy…

Yeah, I’m not too bothered, they give it so I’m happy.

The kick at the end, how proud are you that he kicked that?

It was a weird feeling. I spoke to Mikey a few weeks back and we knew that Mikey was going to be our kicker. I said ‘mate, you need to get practising’. He said: ‘I feel better when I just go out and do it’. I thought to myself as a coach do I say ‘no, go practice’ or let him go. I had a lot of faith in him. He kicked well in the semi and that was the moment I was most calm, when he got the ball in his hands because it was a massive moment and his moment. I believed he was going to get it because of the belief he had in himself. It wasn’t about him not doing it because he wanted to take a short cut, that’s what made him feel like he could take that moment. If you overthink it as a kicker, that’s when you’re likely to miss. I felt really calm when he got the ball in his hands because that was his moment and he nailed it.

You had your moment with Neil and the board members at the end, how special was that moment for you?

I think there’s a lot of people that are here and not here, people who have passed, that have contributed to that today. Neil Hudgell has put so much money and time and everything he’s got into this club and we wanted to do it for him for a long time. We wanted to do it for our fans, we’ve got such a loyal bunch. It was the playing group, the last message was go and do it for each other. You should always put others first because it feels good doing something for someone else, but it was important they did it for themselves as a group collectively. We spoke it this being our time, it’s not just ours, there’s a lot of people: players that have been at this club that have moved on, staff, a lot of people have contributed but we have a playing group that we believe in.

I want to say that Warrington were very good today. We got away with it at the end but I thought at some stage maybe it wasn’t our day but we got there.

Is this lift off for this group?

I think what the players need to get from this is real strong belief. A strong belief that they can win a trophy providing they do the work that they’ve done. They’ve put so much work into winning that cup. There was a lot of pressure on the group today and my job is to try and take it away and your job (the press) is to increase it, which you did. But we lose that game and we know what comes with it. The way they won that game shows the character and type of team that they are. It’s our DNA, east Hull people are tough, resilient, they don’t get anything easy and we didn’t get anything easy there at all. We had to fight for it and work for it.

Was there a point you thought it had gone?

There was moments there. We spoke about winning the game in the 79th minute and that was the mentality we wanted to have but we didn’t do that, we tried to win it in the 55th minute. It was a bit like the Grand Final, we kept turning it over in yardage and they kept attacking our line. Sneyd managed the game but then Dean Hadley dived on the loose ball. Two years ago, Leigh had more loose balls than us, Wigan got onto more scraps than us as well. There was a key one at the end of the game and that’s what got us down the field.

Is this the high point of your career?

This is the highest, absolutely. Nothing beats this.

Did you have a guest speaker on Friday night?

Yeah, we had Jamie Peacock come in last night. I’ve wanted to get JP in but it just never worked with timings and schedules and things like that. I wanted to get a player in who had reached the highs of highs and I wanted a winner that was a winner and had to work his way forward. A player that wasn’t the most talented but in terms of effort and competing and work ethic, he lives all of that. He spoke and the players responded today. He spoke about discomfort and the players were uncomfortable for long long periods of that game. Getting through that other side, they certainly did that.

How close did McIlorum come to not playing?

It was a decision that we had to make. He probably won’t play now for the next three weeks, it was courageous. There’s not many players that would have played today, he’s one and I’m honoured to be able to coach a guy like that. The reason for playing Micky Mc was there’s certain players in the team when you’re doing your boots up, you look over and you think I’m going be OK today because we have him there. Micky is one of those. He doesn’t say a great deal but he’s very direct, the players listen and it was always the plan to play him for 20-odd minutes because Jez has been outstanding for us. There was a risk, no doubt, but the risk would have been if we had a couple of injuries, that’s when the risk would have been. If he did rupture it that would have been terrible but he was willing to do that for his teammates and in terms of getting Litten on the field, whether that was the first or the 22nd, we’re comfortable with that.