Sporting weekend

THE weather office is forecasting a wet weekend and has placed a heavy rain alert over the country. A flashflooding alert also remains in force for parts of Vanua Levu and Viti Levu.

It’s not going to dampen the enthusiasm of fans who are anticipating a feast of sports action though.

The national sides are participating in the Vancouver 7s in Canada this weekend. The Fijian Drua take on the might of the Blues in Auckland today, and schoolboy rugby league is on around the country. Then there’s soccer in another round of the National League.

A lot of attention though will no doubt be on Churchill Park in Lautoka when the Melbourne Storm take on the might of the Newcastle Knights in a National Rugby League (NRL) trial match this afternoon.

It’s the first time fans will get to see two top NRL sides, brimming with stars of the game, in action here.

And this is a positive reflection of the lure that is out there for Fijian players.

Let’s face it, at one stage of our sporting development, there was a line doing the rounds, that we had a factory churning out sevens superstars.

The emergence of the Drua has catapulted the image of Fijian players onto a very high plane.

Drua coach Mick Byrne had selected a team of relative unknowns for the start of the 2022 season of the Super Rugby Pacific competition.

They kicked off their foray into the big world of intense competition without so much as a whimper.

Coach Byrne had a host of rookies in the big world of Super Rugby and his unwavering faith in their potential! He placed work ethic over talent!

Why? It’s because “almost every Fijian rugby player had the renowned Fijian flair in them, but only a few had the work ethic and dedication to work on their talent”.

The thing about Fijian rugby players, he said, was every one of them “has the Fijian flair where they instinctively know how to do offloads and things like that…”

Fast forward to 2023, and we zoomed past most of the competition to get a peek into the quarterfinals. It was a warning shot for the competition!

Who can ever forget that 25-24 win over the Crusaders last year at Churchill Park?

It was arguably the most memorable upset in the history of the competition.

The Drua then saw a long list of its players making it into the Flying Fijians for last year’s Rugby World Cup in France.

So it makes sense then that scouts will be out!

We know not every Fijian youngster will grow up to be a doctor, a nurse, a police officer, lawyer, soldier, office worker or business owner.

But we know there is an abundance of talented youngsters who just need a break in league or in rugby union. There are opportunities in sports to start a career.

This afternoon, fans will be in for some top class rugby league action.

The Knights, renowned for their hard-nosed pack coming up against the four-time premiers.

We look forward to an exciting weekend and wish all the teams the very best!