The Kiwi Ferns, Samoa and the Cook Islands have all name their teams for the first week of action in the Pacific Championships, while Australia has selected a star-studded squad ahead of their opening game next week.
The Australian Jillaroos side is stacked with talent led by recent premiership winning captain Ali Brigginshaw and veteran Jillaroo, Kezie Apps. The team is backed by five debutantes including Dally M halfback of the year, Jesse Southwell.
The Australian side has seen a few recent surprises though after Emma Verran withdrew from the squad alongside Sienna Lofipo who choose to instead play for Samoa, representing the side in a number of previous Test series.
This led to the inclusion of Eels fullback Abbi Church and Cowboys prop Mackenzie Weale.
Church represented Australia in the PM’s XIII last year and Weale is set to make her first Test debut after playing six Origin games for Queensland.
Coach Ricky Henry’s Kiwi Ferns side is set to be a strong contender for the Jillaroos, complete with 21 players with NRLW experience.
The 17-person side is led by the Dragon’s Raecene McGregor and the Titan’s Georgia Hale.
Having both competed since the game’s inaugural season in 2018 and alongside fellow Test veteran Apii Nicholls, the trio have a combined 20 campaigns in the Black jersey, making the side well prepared for a deep run in this competition.
‘Competition for spots makes us better’ | 01:45
The New Zealand team will also include four debutants including Tysha Ikenasio, Ivana Lauitiiti, Patricia Maliepo and Shakira Baker.
The Fetu Samoa side, led by coach Jamie Soward, will contest New Zealand and Australia in the Pacific Cup.
Soward has named a strong team with Brisbane’s Annetta-Claudia Nu’uausala set to lead the team while Sienna Lofipo’s decision to turn down a Jillaroos debut to instead represent her home nation will play an inspiring role for the side.
The side will also feature Dally M Rookie of the Year Shalom Sauaso and veterans Destiny Brill and Niall Williams-Guthrie.
Set to play in the second-tier Pacific Bowl is coach Ronald Griffiths’ Cook Islands side which includes four players who worked under his guidance at the Warriors in Lydia Turua-Quedley, Lavinia Kitai, Ashlee Matapo and Kaiyah Atai.
Sharks playmaker Chantay Kiria-Ratu was a lock for the side after a stellar season which saw nine try assists and five line break assists.
She will also be joined by her sister Anne-Marie Kiria-Ratu, who debuted in Round 4 this season, making a clear impact on the Sharks preliminary finals run.
The Cook Islands side will take on PNG and Tonga.
WOMEN’S PACIFIC CHAMPIONSHIPS
SATURDAY OCTOBER 18
PNG Orchids vs Cook Islands Moana at Santos National Football Stadium, Port Moresby, 2.00pm AEDT
PNG team: 1. Fleur Ginn 2. Mala Mark 3. Tia Molo 4. Marie Biyama 5. Naomi Kelly 6. India Seeto 7. Caitlin Tanner 8. Elsie Albert 9. Therese Aiton 10. Emmogen Taumafai 11. Sareka Mooka 12. Leila Kerowa 13. Jessikah Reeves 14. Emily Veivers 15. Essay Banu 16. Gloria Kaupa 17. Mya Muller 18. Delailah Ahose 19. Belinda Gwasamun 20. Ruth Gende
The Sydney CBD desperately needs a new indoor entertainment arena and the NSW Government has been urged to conduct a feasibility study to identify public land where it can be built.
Developers believe up to $500 million of private capital could be invested at no cost to the taxpayer if public land were released with the covered stadium returning to public control once a long lease had expired.
Plans are already being drawn up for a 10,000 seat indoor stadium at the Entertainment Quarter but are reliant on the current 23-year lease being extended to make the investment worthwhile.
Tony Shepherd, chairman of the Entertainment Quarter, said discussions with the NSW government were ongoing to extend the lease and clear the way for $2 billion of investment in the old Easter Show site.
“Part of that development includes a new multipurpose, fully enclosed arena which we think is something Sydney really needs close to the city centre,” he said.
The $500 million arena would be able to accommodate professional basketball matches, boxing contests and mid-sized concert performances.
Sydney only has Qudos Bank Arena at Homebush and nothing to rival Melbourne Arena and Rod Laver Arena in the centre of Melbourne. Potential sites for a new arena include the Bays Precinct and land seized from the Moore Park golf course.
Tom Forrest, chief executive of the Urban Taskforce, said private investors could be encouraged to build an arena on government land and called for the NSW Government to…
Posters with photos of Israelis taken hostage by Hamas – including a young child – appear to have been torn down in Melbourne, as tensions continue to rise over the conflict.
Remains of the posters, which feature missing Israelis under the heading KIDNAPPED and ask passers-by to “please help bring them home alive”, were visible outside Flinders Street Station underpass on Wednesday morning.
The posters appeared to have been torn so none of the victim’s faces were visible, and most of their names — except five-year-old Amelia Alony — also ripped off the wall.
The images are part of the Kidnapped From Israel project, which was started by a group of Israeli artists in New York and features images of real hostages, used with their families’ permission.
The Flinders Street Station posters were not the first ones to be damaged, with people captured on video in London and New York tearing them down.
“On October 7th, 2023 nearly 200 innocent civilians were abducted from Israel into the Gaza Strip by Hamas,” the Kidnapped from Israel project website says.
“With the clear goal of returning these hostages back home safely and immediately, thousands of people have been hanging photos of the hostages in dozens of cities around the world.”
The project has asked people to “place as many posters as possible in the public space” to “create maximise awareness among the global community”.
Relative Raquel Zichik told a United Nations event and CBS news in the US…
A 26-year-old man has been charged with murder and attempted murder following the death of a man in Melbourne’s CBD on Friday night when a driver ploughed into pedestrians on Bourke Street.
The man, which the Herald Sunhas named the man as Zain Khan, is from Melton West, around 45km west of Melbourne.
Eerie footage shows Khan, dressed in all-white, sitting on the roof of the Toyota for several minutes before police officers pulled him down and arrested him.
Police said the man was possibly travelling at 60 to 70 km/hr before the deadly collision and may have accelerated after hitting the pedestrians.
The driver of the Hyundai, a 76-year-old man from Brunswick in Melbourne’s inner north, died at the scene.
Three pedestrians and the driver and passenger of the CX-5, all in their twenties and thirties, were taken to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
In a statement, Victoria Police said the Melton West man had been charged with one count of murder, three counts of attempted murder, three counts of intentionally cause serious injury and two counts of conduct endangering life.
He appeared at an after-hours court hearing where he was remanded in custody to reappear at Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on 15 January 2024.
Two teenage boys will face arson charges following a massive blaze in Melbourne’s CBD.
Emergency services rushed to the fire at an abandoned warehouse on Clarendon St between Crown Casino and the CityLink in Southbank about 4pm Thursday.
No one was inside the premises at the time, but a thick plume of smoke was seen for kilometres, and the building sustained “extensive damage”.
Firefighters arrived to find one building engulfed in flames before it quickly spread to a neighbouring factory.
Two teenagers, aged 13 and 15, were arrested at Southern Cross Station on Friday afternoon, with police at the time saying they were not looking for anyone else at the time.
On Saturday, Victoria Police revealed the two boys had been released pending further enquiries, and are expected to be charged with arson.
“Police also expect to charge the teens with a series of thefts, robberies, and an attempted armed robbery in Melbourne’s CBD in recent weeks,” a spokesperson said.
Video of the incident shows the factory’s roof engulfed in flames at the most intense point of the blaze.
A group of 35 firefighters battled the blaze for about 50 minutes, with some crews donning breathing apparatus to begin an “internal attack” on the fire.
It’s unclear how the fire started, but it was immediately being treated as suspicious by Victoria Police.
The fire caused traffic chaos as Clarendon St was closed in both directions, as well as the Line 12 tram that runs through South Melbourne….
