There is a history of teams struggling after World Club Challenges.
In 2008, Leeds Rhinos defeated one of the greatest ever sides to take to a rugby league field in the shape of the Melbourne Storm and a week later they lost to the team who finished bottom in 2008: Castleford Tigers.
In 2018, after going down under, the Rhinos lost to eventually relegated Widnes Vikings.
Meanwhile, in 2020, St Helens’ form wasn’t great after battling it out with Sydney Roosters,
So, after the jubilation of defeating Penrith Panthers in their own backyard, could the Saints struggle against Castleford on Channel 4 this weekend?
After the win, Lewis Dodd, revealed Saints’ plan for this week on ABC Sports:
“We fly back tomorrow, land Monday morning about 9am and then we play Sunday afternoon so it’s a bit of a rough week but I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Meanwhile, he outlined the difficulty of golden point extra time, the spell in the game that would make him the match winner:
“We came here to prove a point, win, lose, draw, no matter what, we came here to prove a point and just show how good we really are. I think we did that tonight, whether we lost that one it doesn’t matter. We just proved how good we are.
“That shows the class of Penrith, 12-0 down many teams sort of crumble over but Penrith are a really good side, we believed the hype about Penrith. They’re missing a few players and a couple have moved on but they’re still a classy outfit.
“The golden point is stuff you practice in training, that’s just muscle memory. That’s repetitive, repetitive, repetitive and you keep doing it for moments like that.
