This month Digicel Pacific sends six Rising Rugby Stars from three Pacific nations to IRANZ the world’s leading high performance Rugby Academy in New Zealand next month.  This is first time in history the Pacific islands will contribute players to the academy where they will be coached by all-time rugby greats like Murray Mexted, Sean Fitzpatrick, John Eales, Nick Farr Jones and many other internationally renowned players.

The Digicel Rising Rugby Stars team comprises of six rugby players from Samoa, Tonga and Papua New Guinea who have shown promise, commitment, skill, good character and good standing to the game and their communities. Each selected player has been nominated through a group decision with coaches and Rugby Football Union involvement.  

The Team includes Samoa’s Pita Semeane and Iosefo Repeti Lafo, Tonga’s Maleko Latu and Otelea Katoa and Papua New Guinea’s Billy Torea and Christopher Kakah. Running for three weeks the academy’s course will arm these players with mental, physical and emotional knowledge to help them advance in their rugby careers.  These players will return home with improved skill and discipline and a serious goal to play for their country.

Digicel Pacific Commercial Director, Darren McLean commented on the program yesterday from Brisbane “we are delighted to again be involved in helping develop Pacific Island rugby talent and contribute players to the IRANZ for the first time. We expect that the six selected players will learn from these rugby greats and return equipped with advanced skills and determination to represent their country on the global stage”.

IRANZ’s Managing Director and former All Black captain Murray Mexted gave an overview of the program and their objective for the project “our High Performance and Advanced Players’ courses have a balance between practice and theory and are designed to show players what they need to know about themselves and what they need to do to reach their maximum potential. They all have different strengths and our goal is to help players refine those areas, giving them the confidence to use those strengths as their point of difference. Naturally they all have areas we can assist with and we aim to identify those areas and provide them with the means to improve”.

He continued “I am pleased that for the first time ever we have Pacific Island players involved in the program and am grateful for Digicel for making this happen”.

The players depart for the academy on January 29^th. To follow their progress and get daily updates visit the Facebook pages for the three contributing countries.