Super League chief Robert Elstone hails Nou Camp occasion

Super League chief executive Robert Elstone says Saturday’s game at the Nou Camp is a big statement of ambition and intent for the competition.

Challenge Cup winners Catalans beat Super League champions Wigan 33-16 in front of a new Super League regular season record crowd of 31,555.

Elstone said: “The whole of Super League was excited by Nou Camp. It is such big statement of ambition and intent and we should salute the two Chairmen involved – the vision and enterprise shown by Catalans’ Bernard Guasch, and the unhesitatingly support offered by Wigan’s Ian Lenagan.

“I don’t think anything in Super League’s 24-year history will have achieved those objectives more explicitly than a game at the Nou Camp.”

In a statement issued after the game, Super League said the fixture was part of the sport’s continued innovation to engage new audiences.

It came 10 years after Catalans had taken a game to Barcelona’s Montjuic Olympic Stadium, when they played Warrington in 2009.

With Huddersfield’s John Smith’s Stadium, Hull’s KCOM Stadium and Wigan’s DW Stadium all football grounds too, the Nou Camp is the fourth football stadium to host Super League in 2019 – with games set to follow at Anfield next week for Magic Weekend, the Grand Final at Old Trafford in October and the Challenge Cup final at Wembley.