The Warpath

Rugby Union On

In New Guinea

By Jim Huxley, former Managing- Editor, “New Guinea Times Courier”

Although Rugby league has

been the main code of Rugby played in Papua and New Guinea for a dozen or so years, there is an indication that Rugby union will issue the 13-a-side game with a real challenge, and I believe that challenge will be quite evident before the end of the 1966 season.

UNTIL this year league had been “the” game in the Territory.

Union had taken on to some extent in Port Moresby, but was never considered a great threat to the part professional league set-up. It will, most likely, continue to be the under dog code there, but it will become much stronger than it is now.

Over on the New Guinea side there was no union at all—it was all league. Players and supporters were just as fanatical about it as their counterparts in Port Moresby.

But, towards the end of the season just concluded union was introduced to New Guinea. A team of past and present Goroka league players, cal ling themselves New Guinea, accom modated a team from Port Moresby, known as Papua, and beat them on the Goroka Showground, 5-3, for the HMAS Melbourne Cup.

The trophy had been given by the sportsmen of the warship for annual competition between the Papua and New Guinea Rugby unions, when the ship was in Port Moresby on a visit a week or two before the inaugural “Inter-territory” clash.

From all reports the “Papua” side was a younger, fitter, speedier and much lighter combination than the big, slow but very experienced “New Guinea” XV.

“New Guinea” was led by former champion Australian union lock forward and planter Brian Johnson— now, ironically, a legend in Territory Rugby league circles. With him in the line-up were another ex-union international, long retired Neil Latimer, and former Sydney first grade league players Athol Preston and Rob Hannon, the present stars of the Goroka league side.

The union fixture at Goroka was played soon after the Highlanders

had lost the Kearin-Sheargold Trophy league competition to Lae, after holding it for five years.

The match was well supported and with Goroka no longer “King of the League”, union, under the Johnson influence—just as league did under Johnson—should flourish and spread.

Rugby league, last season, had a bad trot on the mainland of New Guinea. Only three towns contested the mter-town series—against six the previous season—and at times the game fell to a record low as far as players and supporters were con cerned. And this was most noticeable in Lae, despite the fact that Lae had produced the inter-town premiers.

I believe that Rugby union has thus presented itself in the New Guinea region at a most opportune time.

League is played as an amateur game in New Guinea and has very little to offer the participant. In most cases he pays to play and over a season it becomes a costly affair.

Union, on the other hand, is con tested at the South Pacific Games and therefore offers an incentive to the young player. Even in non- Games years, tours could be ar ranged against Fiji, Tonga, Samoa and other Pacific countries, as well as Australia. In Australia union is not as strong as league, which means a Papua-New Guinea side could compete on a competitive basis.

Now what does the future hold for Rugby union in New Guinea?

I am a league supporter from way back, and personally would hate to see union take over, but unless the league authorities, both in New Guinea and Australia, get right on the ball with some top drawer administration and promotion union is going to move right in. Not just as another game of Rugby, but as THE game of Rugby.

A big percentage of European league players in the Territory are really union enthusiasts, playing league for convenience, and they would surely switch back to union if given the opportunity.

Native players could get just as much satisfaction playing union as they do get out of league, and the possibility of getting trips to other parts of the Pacific would, I believe, help to lift their game and be in centive enough for them to switch codes.

Many have terrific potential as footballers, and from New Guinea will come some really great future players.

One thing is certain at this stage: Rugby league in New Guinea, for the first time in its history, has some real opposition.