When Hull KR held on for the final few minutes of February’s World Club Challenge against the Brisbane Broncos, it would have been difficult amid the celebrations to imagine their season would have ended in this manner. Super League’s defending champions did, in the end, make it into the playoffs, but they appear to be a level below the other five teams.

Their journey into the six was also made slightly easier by St Helens, the only other team alive in the chase for the final playoff spot, watching their hunt crumble around them. With the Super League table having largely taken shape ahead of round 27, the match between the two could have decided who would extend their season into September. It could have been the crescendo to what Super League had newly branded ‘The Final Charge,’ a one-game shootout for one playoff position, or, to quote Hugh Grant’s character in Guy Ritchie’s 2019 film The Gentlemen, ‘a good old-fashioned cock-off.’

But Saints’ losses across the previous two weeks against Leeds and Leigh at an aggregate score of 82-16 meant that Rovers almost accidentally ended up in the top six. Coach Willie Peters was able to play a young side guided by Mikey Lewis against St Helens, potentially as much a test for Lewis as it was for those around him, as Saints ended their season with a 36-12 victory. 

My central concern for Rovers is this though: by making the playoffs after a down year, are they in a worse position than if they hadn’t? Both KR and St Helens have new head coaches arriving for the start of 2027, but by missing the six, Saints can view their season as an abject failure and start again. On the other side of the coin, does backing up a quadruple-winning season with at least making the playoffs mean Hull KR will see positives to take for next year, and underestimate how much needs fixing?

Granted, the team that won the Grand Final last year is not the same team they have today. The impact of Jared Waerea-Hargreaves’s one season in the league would have been hard to replicate by anyone else. Despite the plaudits Jez Litten understandably receives, Micky McIlorum was a key part of their two-pronged hooking attack. While both players have been somewhat replaced, it’s only been in name, as the difficulties in replicating their output have been laid bare. Arthur Mourgue has had a Sisyphean season from hell, as every return from injury seemed to only ever end in another setback. 

Hull KR managed to climb the mountain. In fact, they managed to climb every mountain that was put in front of them in 2025. The problem this year has been whether too many in the squad would prefer to bask in the glory of having summited those mountains, rather than look for the next peak. 

At the end of last year, Mikey Lewis had been man of the match in the Grand Final, started the first Ashes series in the number 7 shirt, and only narrowly missed out on winning Man of Steel. By two games into the 2026 season, he’d been shown a yellow card for a deliberate trip in his side’s curtain-raising loss to newly-promoted York, and celebrated winning the World Club Challenge by asking people out in Hull ‘what have you won in your career?’ 

Lewis became the example of how one of the game’s most promising young players, weighed down by attitude issues, can flourish when given a coach with an obsessive focus on discipline. This year though, we’ve seen what happens when the player lets down their end of the bargain. Just weeks ago, Lewis was banned again for three weeks after being shown a yellow card for charging at Warrington’s Ewan Irwin when Wire’s young half sent up a kick. It was another brainfade for Lewis on a night when Hull KR were just never in the game against a top side, the type of night they’ve had far too many times this year. 

And it’s the exact same opponent that Hull KR will meet on Saturday evening when they travel to the Halliwell Jones Stadium. Feelings are, as outlined perhaps too strongly in this piece, not optimistic towards Rovers’ chances. Wire were victorious both times they met in Super League this year, although KR did beat a George Williams-less Warrington in the Challenge Cup semifinal back in May. 

The end of the 2026 season will mark the end of an era for Hull KR regardless of when it finishes. Willie Peters has changed the history of the club forever, bringing them to the table of clubs that have won the Super League, and giving them a quadruple for good measure. The list of departing players and staff that every rugby league club publishes is led by Peters himself, and backed up by Joe Burgess and Rhyse Martin, two large parts of Peters’ winning machine. 

In a bizarre way, it’s maybe these reasons that give KR the most hope for Saturday evening. Can they put the first 27 rounds of the 2026 Super League season behind them and get up for the man who changed the club’s fortunes one last time?