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Tokouso

Juniors
Messages
18
Polynesians make up more than 50% of the nrl. With the recent influx of talent Samoa,Tonga,Cook isl and fiji are getting and samoa getting close to beating the top 3 sides in the world the nrl should be thinking of letting these island teams go wild and have a competition between each other. The last time they had this was in 2009 where PNG took it out. We need this back and it will help to grow the game in the pacfic.

TEAMS PARTICIPATING:
PNG (current Champions)
Samoa
New Zealand Maori
Australian Aboriginals (Or the Aboriginal All Stars)
Tonga
Fiji
Cook Isl
Niue
Tokelau
America Samoa
Vanuatu
Solomon Islands

It would be a knock out competition and the winner would participate in the 4 nations or qualify for the world cup.
 

jim_57

Moderator
Staff member
Messages
4,287
Simple solution for me would be to just add on a round of games to the current fixtures.

Rep weekend
  • Fiji V PNG - Melanesia Cup
  • Vanuatu V Solomon Is - Melanesia Plate
  • Tonga V Samoa - Polynesia Cup
  • Cook Islands V Nieu - Polynesia Plate
End of season or 2nd rep weekend there is a second group of games, with the best Melanesian and Polynesian team playing for the Pacific Cup. Then the losers of the cup games play the winners of the plate for promotion/relegation for the following season.

Ideally the winner then gets a game against Australia or NZ post season. Gives us a simple Pacific Cup with every team able to compete and leaves the post season open for tours and tournaments.
 

Tokouso

Juniors
Messages
18
Simple solution for me would be to just add on a round of games to the current fixtures.

Rep weekend
  • Fiji V PNG - Melanesia Cup
  • Vanuatu V Solomon Is - Melanesia Plate
  • Tonga V Samoa - Polynesia Cup
  • Cook Islands V Nieu - Polynesia Plate
End of season or 2nd rep weekend there is a second group of games, with the best Melanesian and Polynesian team playing for the Pacific Cup. Then the losers of the cup games play the winners of the plate for promotion/relegation for the following season.

Ideally the winner then gets a game against Australia or NZ post season. Gives us a simple Pacific Cup with every team able to compete and leaves the post season open for tours and tournaments.
Great idea. But where will the nrl have time for the nz maori and aus aboriginals
 

jim_57

Moderator
Staff member
Messages
4,287
Great idea. But where will the nrl have time for the nz maori and aus aboriginals

Play it as the all stars game, that is enough, no good reason to include then in International tournaments IMO.
 

Tokouso

Juniors
Messages
18
America Samoa V Tokelau
Niue V Solomon Isl
Vanutau V Cook isl
Fiji V PNG
Samoa V Tonga
aboriginals V Maori
 

hutch

First Grade
Messages
6,810
There should be a pacific cup every year and I think there will be when we have 3 stand alone rep weekends in he future.

Just pacific countries though, Aus indigenous and nz Maori shouldn't be involved, they are not national test teams.
 

Tokouso

Juniors
Messages
18
There should be a pacific cup every year and I think there will be when we have 3 stand alone rep weekends in he future.

Just pacific countries though, Aus indigenous and nz Maori shouldn't be involved, they are not national test teams.
But it'll be good for them both to play. It would be good for the aboriginals to play someone other than the world stars every year and it'll give both teams more time to play. The NZ Maori team hasn't played since 2014.
 

hutch

First Grade
Messages
6,810
But it'll be good for them both to play. It would be good for the aboriginals to play someone other than the world stars every year and it'll give both teams more time to play. The NZ Maori team hasn't played since 2014.

I agree these teams should play more often, just not in official test series. Would love them to play each other every year and against touring teams.
 

Twizzle

Administrator
Staff member
Messages
150,734

IntRLEnthusiast

Juniors
Messages
127
Yeah i think the pacific cup would be a great idea and i think if you made origin stand alone rep weekends you could do it quite seemlessly. You could even play the internationals over the weekend and still have Origins on the Wednesday's nights. Add in a 3 test series between NZ and England and you have something pretty solid. Having said that i think at the moment the outcry of "no NRL games" and clubs not wanting to release their players will probably mean it won't happen but it doesn't mean that it couldn't or shouldn't. I would purpose though that it only be open to nations and not an NZ Maori team.

To start with i would have 6 teams and figure out a way of working it. I am open to 8 if you could put 8 teams together but i don't know you could yet. Maybe though if it was an 'Asia-Pacific Cup' you might be able to.
 

siv

First Grade
Messages
6,546
I would like to see a 4 nation pacific cup during SOO period

Top 2 qualify to play in a 6 Nations

Plus a 6 nation Pacific Shield post season

Where the winners qualify for next years Pacific Cup
 

yakstorm

First Grade
Messages
5,293
It's a shame that it has been 8 years since the last Pacific Cup and there appears to be no future tournament in sight, especially as the NRL / APRLC could very easily relaunch the tournament by just adding one extra rep game to the schedule.

Taking the cheap and nasty route, having the winners of the Polynesian Cup take on the winners of the Melanesian Cup would be the cheapest way of bringing back the tournament.

Sure the final may not be a true reflection of the two best teams in the Pacific, but it would provide another guaranteed fixture (maybe two if they also do a 3rd v 4th playoff).

Of course if the NRL / APRLC had money to spend, a preferred option would be to have each of the four teams play each other once (3 rounds) with the team at the top of the ladder declared champions.

Arguably in this model you could leave the mid-year Test and simply add two at the end of the year. You could even let each nation host one game at home, one away and one in a neutral venue (Mid-Year).

Anyway it's nice to dream...
 

Force

Juniors
Messages
343
What needs to happen is for the NRL to drop 3 games of the year. Make Origin stand alone weekends so you can play the Pacific Cup games during those weekends. Include NZ and I too think its beneficial for all teams if a NZ Maori and Indigenous OZ are included as they will offer much needed competition and make up the numerical difference for an 8 team comp which will work better over the 3 weekends. So you'll have NZ, Samoa, Fiji, Cook Is, Tonga, PNG, NZ Maori & Ind OZ. You have four games over each weekend, winners play each other to see who advances to the final and the losers play for minor places.

For instance-

Origin Week one:

Fiji vs PNG - Fij
Sa vs Ton - Sa
NZ v Cook - NZ
NZM vs IOZ - IOZ

Origin week two:

Fiji v Sa - Sa
NZ v IOZ - NZ
Ton v PNG- Ton
NZM v Cook - NZM

Origin week three:

(Final) NZ v Sa
(3rd/4th) Fij v IOZ
(5th/6th) Ton v NZM
(7th/8th) Cook v PNG

I would also scrap the Indigenous/All Stars match, that match is pointless but adding IOZ to the Pacific Cup will make up for their lost match.
 

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