1997 World Club Championship

In 1997, the World Club Challenge was restructured to include 22 clubs from the Australasian and European Super League competitions and was known as the Visa World Club Championship. As it was contested over 6 rounds in 2 hemispheres, with AU$1,000,000 prize money (GBP 640,000), the competition was prohibitively expensive to stage, and it reportedly lost over $5,000,000. This, coupled with the poor ratings and attendances that were achieved both in Australia and Europe, led to the competition being postponed for a number of years. No British teams progressed further than the quarter finals. Two Australian teams reached the final: the dominant Brisbane Broncos club and the ill-fated Hunter Mariners.

1997 tournament tables

The Australasian and European teams were each divided into two pools for the 1997 World Club Challenge. Each pool had six teams, with the exception of Australasia B, which had the two lowest placed Super League-aligned teams and the two newly formed teams: the Hunter Mariners and the Adelaide Rams. The finals series was contested between the top three teams in Australasia Pool A and Europe Pool A, and the top team from Australasia Pool B and Europe Pool B.

Australasia Pool A

Australasia Pool B

Europe Pool A

Europe Pool B

1997 tournament matches

Round 1

Round 2

Round 3

Round 4

Round 5

Round 6

Playoff

Quarter-finals

Semi-finals

Final

Aftermath

The dominance of the Australasian sides in...
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