Last Saturday, Tom Halliwell OBE was hob-nobbing with the great and good in the Royal Box at Wimbledon, as he joined his fellow England World Cup winners Rob Hawkins and James Simpson MBE as special guests at the All England Club.
This Saturday, the Leeds Rhinos star will be in more familiar territory, travelling east to the Allam Sport Centre in Hull, where he is expecting the toughest battle yet for places in next month’s Betfred Wheelchair Challenge Cup Final.
As last year, the Rhinos will compete with the other five Wheelchair Super League teams, and the Challenge Cup will again be given an international flavour by the arrival of the Catalans Dragons – fresh from their recent triumph in the French domestic competition, and again including Halliwell’s England team-mate Sebastien Bechara MBE, who was recognised with Halliwell and Simpson in the King’s Birthday Honours List last month.
Only the top two from Saturday’s Round Robin will qualify for the Final, on Sunday August 20 at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield.
“We’re expecting it to be fiery,” said Halliwell, who led the Rhinos to their third consecutive Challenge Cup title with victory over the Catalans in last year’s Final.
“Catalans will definitely be looking at us, and I think they might be coming after me as well, after what happened in the World Cup Final.
“I’ll be well aware of that, and I’m looking forward to the challenge.
“To beat them in the Final last year was a fantastic feeling because we’d been written off from the get-go. Everyone in the Wheelchair Rugby League community thought they’d beat us convincingly, with Seb, Gilles and Nicolas Clausells, and all the other French stars in their team.
“We said no, we’re not having that – and I think winning that day was a massive confidence boost for us as an England team going into the World Cup. We showed the French could be beaten, and even came up with a blueprint for how to do it.”
Not that Halliwell and the Rhinos will be taking the other teams for granted in the battle for Final places.
Hull FC have been big improvers in 2023 and will have home advantage; Wigan Warriors had an impressive win against Hull last weekend; reigning Super League champions Halifax Panthers will be anxious to return to the Final; and the Roosters warmed up for the Cup by becoming the first team to beat the Rhinos this season – albeit a Rhinos team missing their Halliwell and Simpson because of their Wimbledon commitments.
“That result shows how competitive it is this season,” added Halliwell. “The Roosters turning us over in a good competitive game really opens it up for this weekend.”
Reflecting on the Wimbledon experience, he added: “To have the chance to watch Carlos Alcaraz in the flesh, he’s just a phenomenal athlete. You don’t really see on the TV how much pace there is on the ball – serves at 133mph, that’s just ridiculous.
“The whole day was amazing to be honest. None of us had been before, and we found ourselves in the Royal Box and being introduced the crowd.
“I spent a long time talking to Billie-Jean King which was an honour, and she was fantastic – both about tennis, and asking about everything we’d done.
“Then I had AP McCoy sitting behind me with his dad, the Lionesses were there, Gary Lineker – all lovely people, it was amazing to be in their company, and one of those things which we realised we might never get to experience again.”
