I’ve just gotten home from ‘An Evening with Willie Peters’, an event Hull KR held at the Hull New Theatre to celebrate head coach Willie Peters’ four-year stint at Craven Park. It was a fond look back on a spell that brought the club to new heights and brought their first silverware in generations. Hosted expertly by Brian Carney, it was an emotional rollercoaster covering Willie’s entire career, both at the club and before. A tear was brought to my eye at the end of the night when Willie was given a final standing ovation by the Rovers faithful and serenaded with a rousing rendition of ‘Red, Red Robin’.

It got me thinking about how I am going to mark Peters’ departure from my club on this website. It’s something I’ve been percolating ever since it was announced that he was leaving earlier in the year. What can I say that hasn’t already been said? What superlatives can I add about a man who brought the club not only success, but a positive culture shift on and off the pitch? Well, for one thing, I was hoping it could wait a few more weeks for us to get back to Old Trafford, but even I, the eternal optimist when it comes to my team, could see that was a step too far. No, I said everything I wanted to say about Hull KR’s 2026 season decline in my Post Mortem post. I need to mark his farewell with something a bit more personal.

This column/article/whatever you want to call is going to discuss a bit about my personal life, which I totally understand you not being interested in. You’re here for my searing takes on rugby league¹, not my life story; I get that, so I won’t blame you if you skip this long ramble of explaining why last season (and one night in February 2026) means so much to me personally.

In early 2025, my life started to unravel somewhat. I had long suffered with my mental health ever since being a teenager, compounded by a diagnosis of ADHD & autism in my late twenties; it started to once again rear its head in my day-to-day life. My marriage to my then-husband fell apart in April/May of 2025, and I found myself at the lowest point I had been in for many years. I was, to put it bluntly, a wreck².

I distinctly remember the Challenge Cup semi-final against Catalans Dragons at York. It came the day after my marriage came to a final end; I remember waking that day feeling empty, not just empty, but devoid of any light whatsoever. My world was crashing down around me, and to say I couldn’t be less in the mood to go to York is putting it mildly. I remember messaging my group chat I had with my fellow Rovers PDRL players, and their support, coupled with my family’s, and spurred on by my now ex-husband encouraging me to go³, I got on the coach to York.

I remember a feeling of relief at the final whistle. Not just because my team were going back to Wembley, but because I felt I had something to live for now. I felt joy, true joy, for the first time in that desperately awful week. I saw another PD player on the way out, and nearly broke down in tears as we celebrated. That’s what Rovers’ journey through 2025 gave me; it gave me hope again.

I can’t pretend the following month or so between the semi-final and final was easy, because it wasn’t. Anyone will tell you: a relationship breaking down is tough; a marriage, what with paperwork and splitting your possessions, not to mention any pets you might have⁴, is several notches worse. Still, I kept going because I had Wembley to look forward to.

In a cruel twist of fate (and long-time readers might remember me mentioning this before), the last time Hull KR had played at Wembley had been my wedding day. So, while it was my main focus of something to look forward to, it was also a reminder of loss, both the 2023 final and, subsequently, the loss of my husband⁵. I needed Rovers to win that game. Not just because I wanted them to win a trophy, but to expunge the bad memories surrounding the game.

Then, for most of the game, it seemed like the team didn’t get the memo. A creeping feeling of dread grasped me (and probably everyone else in red and white) as the seconds and the minutes clicked by. Was this what we were destined to be? Bottle jobs? Also rans? It was a bleak twenty minutes or so… and then.

You all know what happened next. Tyrone May. Tom Davies. Mikey Lewis. Pandemonium. Joy. Ecstasy. Forty years of hurt for the club washed away in five minutes, and as joyous a five-minute period as I have ever experienced, and certainly the most I had smiled in the month preceding it. The tears were ones of joy, instead of desperation and despair.

It was all the sweeter to share it with my dad, who I went to Craven Park with as a little kid, who I used to ask what it was like to watch the Rovers teams of yore win trophies, because I had only ever known us to be the little brother of the city. His joy was just as important as mine as he punched the air, shouting at the top of his voice, just like I was. I wish I could bottle that feeling. I’d make a fortune.

There were to be more good times ahead, of course, and having going to the rugby to look forward to helped me through that awful period; it kept me focused on wanting to see what was next. It gave me a place I felt happy; I loved going to Craven Park, just as I always had, seeing the same faces, sharing it with the people and bathing in that beautiful atmosphere that accompanies success. It made me realise that there was still joy to be had, still life to be lived.

There was the night the League Leaders’ Shield was won, spent in a bar in Bulgaria with my friend, Kurt. Having to find a bar willing to play a niche sport that no one in Bulgaria knows about, with a dear friend like I had with me. The game didn’t finish until midnight local time, by which time the buses had stopped, so we had to trek back down the beach in the pitch black, always fun for a blind person after a few steins of beer, but not caring a jot. We had the moment Arthur Mourgue went through the young Warrington team, the try that put us ahead, that won us a league leaders’ shield (along with Tyrone May’s second try of the game).

Then there was Old Trafford, of course. The nervy start when Wigan bombed a try, and Mikey saved another one. Taking control with a Mikey Lewis try, followed by Joe Burgess diving over in the corner. History was happening in front of our eyes, and I could feel joy unbridled once more. It felt like watching Rovers in those months taught me how to be happy again; there was a happy place, and it was here. Joe Burgess’ intercept try sealed the deal and put a cork on a perfect season for the club, redemption for all those that had fallen at the final hurdle in a red and white shirt.

If there’s one day I wish I could re-visit and re-live over and over again it is the 19th of February, 2026. That whole day was a whirlwind. I had successfully applied to be a part of the World Club Relay event, taking a match ball from Craven Park to the MKM Stadium, via the hands of several applicants, my part of the journey was only about fifteen minutes long, it flew by in a haze, and I just wished I’d savoured it. There I was, holding a ball that would be used in the biggest club game in rugby league, and it had my team’s crest on it! Nathan from 2006 wouldn’t have believed that. He’d have been happy to just see us in Super League, but there we were, top of the table.

Then we broke the Broncos. All week, anyone who was anyone had written Rovers off. I had no strong feeling that we were going to win, but there was just a voice in the back of my mind saying: “you know, we could just win this…” Then we did. We did it in a way that is so typically Rovers too. We had to make it difficult for ourselves. 30-4 up and cruising in the second half, the atmosphere relaxes, then the Broncos hit back. Four tries in just over fifteen minutes, but they’d left themselves too tall a mountain to climb with too little time. Rovers dug in and closed the game out.

If I could freeze a moment to live in, it would be the post-match celebrations after that win. As it happened, we didn’t stay for long. I had my Guide Dog, Jackson, with me, as I usually do at games. He wasn’t missing the biggest game in club history, and the fireworks and ballyhoo were a bit much for him, but those moments we did experience were pure magic. Magic that you wish you could live in forever.

In the end, that’s what Willie Peters leaves us with: magic. Magical memories of a time so few of us ever dreamed we’d experience. He brought pride back to a club and a community that had been lacking it for so long. Often derided by our bigger neighbours, it was now our turn to be the teller of, instead of the butt of, jokes. Far more than that though, through his work coaching the team, and being a part of this marvellous club, he brought one very sad man joy, at a time when he needed it the most.

Thanks Willie. All the best in PNG. Remember: you’ll always be a Robin.

Written by Nathan Major (Site editor & Hull KR fan)

1. Fat chance. ↩︎
2. I promise this is going to get back to rugby. ↩︎
3. To be clear, the seperation was amicable, and we remain friends. He has given his consent for me to talk about this here. ↩︎
4. I dread to think what it must be like having children in this scenario. If I’d have lost either of my cats, that might have been the final push over the edge for me. ↩︎
5. Through divorce, I mean. He’s still alive. ↩︎