Palais coach, Eleanoa Kunatuba, will be introducing a number of incentives leading up to a number of tournaments in the coming months, as well as the 2015 Port Moresby Pacific Games.
Without a direct pathway or incentive in place for women’s rugby in the country as yet, head coach for the Palais, and development officer for the Federation of Oceania Rugby Union, Elenoa Kunatuba, is on the road to establishing what will grow women’s rugby in Papua New Guinea.
From its humble beginnings in 2007 with only 4 teams of 7s that pioneered in the first ever women’s tournament, and the rookies 7s, today, that number has grown significantly.
There are now an additional three unions playing womens rugby – CRU, Madang, and recently, Morobe that started this month.
Kunatuba’s aim is creating development programs identical to the Brumbies and Monier Pukpuks performance enhancement program, especially with mainstream competitions and tournaments in the coming months.
Kunatuba will announce a train-on squad for the PNG Palais next week. She says, the selection will be very tough, with a lot more women showing interest, this has also surfaced a lot of unseen talent.
