Papua New Guinea’s clash with New Zealand on Sunday isn’t just a long time coming, it’s the culmination of international rugby league’s best kept secret.
The Kumuls have quietly become a Test football success story that can change the face of the game in the country where they love the sport the most.
A shot at a Tier 1 nation is a rare thing for them. Sunday will be just the third time in the last 10 years they’ll take on one of the old powers.
But they’re ready for this, have no doubt of it, and they’ve earned it plenty of times over.
“It’s a big opportunity for us. It’s something we’ve been building towards for a long time, playing in these big games against the big nations. We’ve worked really hard for this,” captain Rhyse Martin said.
“For the country, for rugby league itself, we’ve seen what it’s meant for other nations to get stronger and competitive. That’s what we’re looking for.”
The Kumuls are currently in the midst of the most consistent run in their history to become the best Test side outside of the big five of Australia, New Zealand, England, Samoa and Tonga.
Since their breakthrough win over Great Britain in 2019 they’ve won eight of 11 matches. Their only defeats have come to Fiji last year – which they’ve avenged twice over in the 12 months since – and to Tonga and England in the 2022 World Cup, the former of which came courtesy of a try in the dying minutes.
The recipe for it has been simple. Papua New Guinea has never lacked for talent or passion but getting homegrown players into professional systems, either in England or Australia has made all the difference.
Their great advance is the opposite to Tonga and Samoa’s top down approach and it’s perhaps this lack of comparative star power that has allowed the Kumuls to sneak under the radar.
The latest cab off the rank is Judah Rimbu, a redoubtable hooker or lock who will head to Super League side Castleford next year. He is the pride of the village of Rogoma in the Southern Highlands province and playing for the Kumuls is the honour of his life.
“I’m so grateful to represent my tribe, my village, my nation. I’m so blessed because everyone in PNG dreams of pulling on the Kumuls jersey and I get to do it.
“Rogoma supported me, my mum and all my siblings. They’ve been supporting me all the way and they’re so passionate about me playing the top grade.
“That’s Papua New Guinea, it’s the greatest support you can have.
“I moved down to Port Moresby six or seven years ago but when I go back to the village they welcome me like a star, like a superstar, even though I’m not.
“I’m so passionate, I’m so blessed, I’m so happy to represent Rogoma and my family and Papua New Guinea.”
Rimbu is coming off a terrific season for the PNG Hunters in the Queensland Cup where he scored 16 tries, had five try assists, averaged 82 metres per game and finished fourth in the competition for both tackles made and tackles broken.
He became the second Hunters player to claim the Petero Civoniceva Medal as the competition’s player of the year and has looked more than comfortable at Test level since making his debut last year.
The 23-year old’s move to Castleford is the next step in what is shaping as an exciting future, one which he’s determined to push to its limits.
“Growing up I would always play, but just for fun. Mum looked after us all and there were six of us in the family and as I matured I knew I had to do something to help,” Rimbu said.
“So I put my heart and soul into training, I put my heart and soul into rugby. I stay focused, I set my goals month by month and year by year until I achieve them.
“I worked really hard. I love working hard. I’m not a big guy, or a top class player but hard work beats talent and the future will take care of itself.
“I’m so keen, it’s going to be hard to leave my family but this is my future and I have to make those hard decisions. I’m so pumped to go to Castleford.”
Rimbu is PNG’s latest success story but the path he’s walking is well worn. Justin Olam still might be the only Hunters product to make the NRL since their inception in 2014 but Super League is dotted with Papua New Guineans.
Prop Sylvester Namo is already at Castleford, hard-hitting centre Rodrick Tai has found a home in Warrington and Edwin Ipape, who will miss Sunday due to injury, has become one of Super League’s best dummy halves since joining Leigh Leopards.
Martin, who qualifies through heritage and has been playing for PNG for 10 years now, has witnessed the change first-hand.
“When I first started there was just a handful of blokes doing that and now three-quarters of the team are in Super League or the NRL,” Martin said.
“I put a lot of that down to what the Hunters have done, they’ve got a lot of players through the Queensland Cup and those boys have made their way up the order. It’s been a long journey, but it’s exciting.
“In PNG we have so much talent the coaches over there are tyring so hard to get them into a system somewhere.
“Every year we come into camp and there’s two or three new boys who have had a great year with the Hunters and get an opportunity with the Kumuls. There’s so much talent over there, they just need the opportunity.”
The effects took a while to rise to the surface for the Kumuls but now they are unmistakeable.
Gone are the days when PNG had little beyond their trademark berserker physicality and aggression and while Port Moresby is still a fortress for them, they’re now capable of winning on the road as well.
Nobody can match PNG for raw rugby league passion. (Getty Images: Michael Dodge)
They still play hard, because anyone who wears their colours must, but now they know how to play smart, how to grind a game out and how to win.
It’s why they were able to whether the storm in a stirring win against Fiji a fortnight ago in Suva and why, when the Cook Islands raced out to a shock early lead in Port Moresby last week, they stayed on the job to eventually run out comfortable victors to lock up the Pacific Championship Bowl tournament for the second year in a row.
“When I first came in we had to sit down and write it all on the board, now we come in and say what we want to do and everybody knows it,” Martin said.
“The understanding around the game itself, understanding how things go together towards game planning. Simple things, like kicking to the corners, running behind the markers or the A defender.
“We’re not wasting time, everyone is on the same page straight away and everyone understands the details.
“That’s what all the other nations are doing well, the details around the small things in the game and that’s where we’re headed.”
The next step for PNG is getting players into the NRL, which could be happening sooner rather than later given exciting youngster Morea Morea has scored a train and trial contract with the Cowboys for the summer.
If the league is to push ahead with its plans for a Papua New Guinea expansion team, cultivating such homegrown talent is crucial.
Test matches, particularly those against the big countries, are the best way for that talent to put itself on show for eager clubs who are forever on the hunt for buried treasure.
The way forward seems so clear. More games against the top sides means more exposure, which means more opportunity, which leads to better players pulling on the red, black and yellow, which leads to more games against the top sides and the faster it all happens again.
But for now, the future for the Kumuls doesn’t extend beyond Sunday, where a good showing will be crucial.
They have come so far and they want to prove it. New Zealand are undermanned and hurting after their emotional defeat to Tonga last week. They are as vulnerable as a Tier 1 side can be.
Papua New Guinea’s last meeting with a top class nation did not go well – they were smashed 46-6 by England in 2022 in a match where they failed to find any of their best football.
It was disappointing, because these days the Kumuls are not just happy to be there.
On Sunday they are playing to win, like they always do these days, and with their rugged, high-intensity, physically draining style an ambush of the Kiwis feels possible, even if it is unlikely.
“It’s been a long time since we had a chance like this against a team like this and it’s good for us to go up the rankings,” Rimbu said.
“They’ve been up top for decades now, I’m so excited to see how it is against them.
“We’re looking forward to making history.”
