Winfield Cup
Australian rugby league trophy
title: "Winfield Cup" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["rugby-league-trophies-and-awards", "rugby-league-competitions-in-australia", "tobacco-advertising", "rugby-league-competitions-in-new-south-wales", "recurring-sporting-events-established-in-1982", "1982-establishments-in-australia", "sports-leagues-established-in-1982", "australian-sports-trophies-and-awards", "new-south-wales-rugby-league-premiership", "national-cup-competitions", "british-american-tobacco"] description: "Australian rugby league trophy" topic_path: "sports" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winfield_Cup" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0
::summary Australian rugby league trophy ::
::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/73/Winfield_Cup.jpg" caption="The Winfield Cup trophy"] ::
The Winfield Cup was an Australian rugby league trophy awarded to the winner of the New South Wales Rugby League premiership (NSWRL) Grand Final from 1982 to 1994, and then to the winner of the newly-founded Australian Rugby League (ARL) Grand Final in 1995.
Despite its name, the trophy was retired after the 1995 ARL season when cigarette manufacturer Winfield was forced to withdraw their sponsorship, following the Australian Federal Government's introduction of the Tobacco Advertising Prohibition Act 1992 which outlawed tobacco advertising in sports in Australia. Winfield were not the first tobacco company to sponsor the NSWRL Premiership, however; from 1960 to 1981 the pre-season competition was sponsored by W. D. & H. O. Wills.
A redesigned ARL premiership trophy, the Optus Cup, was introduced in 1996 and lasted until 1997 before the ARL and Super League merged to form the National Rugby League (NRL) in 1998.
''The Gladiators''
The Winfield Cup trophy was a three-dimensional bronze cast of a famous photo called The Gladiators,{{cite web |title=The Gladiators |publisher=St George Leagues Club |url=http://www.stgeorge.org.au/images/news/news_images/provan_summons_black200x330.jpg |access-date=2008-05-14 |archive-date=22 July 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080722003155/http://www.stgeorge.org.au/images/news/news_images/provan_summons_black200x330.jpg |url-status=dead |title=Biography |publisher=Alan Ingham |url=http://www.alaningham.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=5&Itemid=26 |access-date=2008-05-14}}
Winners
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References
::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::