Super League coach calls for overhaul of captain’s challenge as pundit sounds off

The captain’s challenge was introduced to Super League for 2025 amid huge demand but it’s failed to deliver so far, with one coach calling for a major overhaul of the system.

Super League and the NRL adopt rule changes from the other all the time and one rule that the NRL has had for a while, which Super League fans, pundits and even coaches have yearned for, is the captain’s challenge.

Quite simply, when play stops a team’s captain can challenge a refereeing decision which is then reviewed on the spot. In the NRL, it seems to work flawlessly but in Super League, it’s far from perfect.

In fact, Castleford Tigers head coach Danny McGuire has called for major change to how it works, with pundit Jon Wilkin going a step further and demanding that Super League ‘get rid of it’.

McGuire appeared as a guest on Wilkin and Jenna Brooks’ podcast, The Bench, in which guests put something on the bench, i.e. something they wish to remove from the game.

For McGuire, that was the captain’s challenge and he was fairly conclusive on the matter.

“Can’t work out how players are tired” – Super League coach calls for changes to captain’s challenge

Asking if the captain’s challenge had been put forward as an idea to be benched, McGuire would explain his issues with it, bemoaning how much it slows the game down.

“If we keep it, there needs to be a time frame on it because it just takes too long,” he argued.

“The game is too slow now and I was having a debate with someone the other day and I can’t work out how players are tired.

“There are that many stoppages in the game for captain’s challenges, we’re sat there for three and four minutes.”

He concluded: “Our game has always been about speed and people tiring and fatiguing each other. Stop stopping that game.”

Jon Wilkin would go further, explaining that whilst almost everyone in rugby league thought it would be beneficial, it simply hasn’t proved that way.

“The captain’s challenge has to go,” he declared.

“You can change your mind, I can say that twelve months ago I thought captain’s challenge would be a good addition. I can now say, having watched it, that the unintended consequence of it is that it’s slowing the game down and adding zero entertainment.

“An idea that sounded great, I’m admitting didn’t work. I think we were all wrong. It needs to go, get rid of it.”

He would also point to the NRL and their success with it, accepting he would be fine with Super League retaining a captain’s challenge if they could execute as well as those Down Under.

Wilkin expanded: “The Nathan Cleary try in Origin two was chalked off for obstruction in less than a minute. That’s cool if we can do that. If we can’t then we need to stop as many stoppages. Danny is right, players have no right to be tired.”