One of Wests Warriors’ pre-season goals was to reach the Challenge Cup third round.
Since the club’s foundation in 2014, the amateur London side have only played in the competition on four occasions and reached the third round once, in 2017. Hard-fought wins against Skirlaugh and local rivals London Chargers saw them achieve that goal.
Progress to the third round – the club’s first time in six years – also saw the introduction of Championship sides to the competition, a level of opposition Wests have never faced.
When the draw took place last Monday, club founder and head coach, Kimbo Parkinson, assembled the squad to watch the draw. What happened next, he’ll hardly forget.
“Just before they drew our ball out, I said: ‘we’re up next,’” Parkinson recalls.
“Sure enough our ball came out. The lads turned to me and said: ‘alright, who are we playing?’ I joked and said Widnes Vikings and out they came. The boys thought I’d stitched them up and it wasn’t live.”
Widnes Vikings are no ordinary Championship team. John Kear’s side are seven-time winners of the trophy – the fifth most of any club.
One of the sport’s founding members, their last Challenge Cup win came in 1984 – 30 years before Wests Warriors were founded by Parkinson, who moved to London from New Zealand in 2004.
“Never in my wildest dreams did I think something like this could happen when we started,” Parkinson reflects when we speak a couple of days after the draw.
“The players, the coaches, everyone involved is over the moon. This is a massive opportunity for our club, it doesn’t come around too often that you’re able to play against a Championship club – it may never happen again to us so we’re just excited to take it all in.”
Despite their short history, the Acton-based community club have grown to become one of the best sides in the Southern Conference League (SCL) – one of the regional divisions in rugby league’s amateur fourth tier – and have won the league the last two seasons.
Widnes sit fifth in the Championship after five games and Parkinson is under no illusion of the task facing his side but is also excited at the huge opportunity the match represents.
“We know it’s gonna be a tough game but hopefully Widnes are looking forward to hosting us and taking us seriously,” he said. “We’ll prepare the same and treat it like any other match in the build-up but we going up there to enjoy the moment and give it everything we’ve got.
“It’s about more than just us as a club. It’s great publicity for Rugby League in London – we’re not just going up there to represent ourselves but the whole community in the South and the SCL so any exposure we get will be amazing.”
Saturday’s fixture had initially seen Widnes drawn as the away side but without the necessary facilities at Wests’ home ground and a lack of alternative venues in the capital, the fixture was reversed and it will now be the London side who make the trip up north.
The RFL have helped with some travel costs but Wests’ amateur stars will have to fork out their own money for a hotel on the Friday night before the game.
One such player is Wests captain, Chris Watkins, who first joined the club in 2021 and is one of many Kiwi-born players in the squad.
“I’d known about the club for quite a while because of a relationship with my club that I played for back in New Zealand,” he said. “I had quite a few mates over the years who have played for the club so when I moved over, they got me down and involved.
“For me, it was just an opportunity to meet some mates, get back into the sport and blow off some steam at the end of the week. It just so happens that we get on and play really well but I never thought it would get to this stage.”
For many in the squad like Watkins, Saturday will represent the biggest game of their careers to date but the captain is also confident he can lean on the knowledge of other members of the squad with professional academy experience.
“We’ve got some players who have played to a decent standard – our half-back Jack Payne spent some time in France with Avignon and we’ve got guys from the London Skolars system so they’re used to big games,” Watkins added.
“Naturally, they’ll be some nerves, there are always some nerves before a game but everyone is pumped and excited. There has been non-stop communication between us all this past week and we’re just looking forward to getting stuck in.”
Those nerves may be present as the game looms but Watkins has no doubt his side will rise to the occasion on Saturday and provide a stern challenge for the northern opponents.
“We like to play fast rugby and shift the ball,” he said. “Historically, we’ve always had one of the smallest packs going around so we like to spin the ball wide, play an exciting brand of rugby and chance our arm.
“We’re confident in our game plan, we know our ability and we know what we can do.”
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Featured image Credit: Wests Warriors
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Nice to see aSCL coming to Widnes. Looking forward to the game. Good luck to Wests and I hope you enjoy playing in our great stadium.
GED Viking fan.