Early bookings don’t fly well with Kiwis

Kiwis captain Jesse Bromwich has hit out at a ‘‘disrespectful’’ decision by Rugby League World Cup organisers to pre-book the New Zealanders flights home a day after Saturday’s semifinal.

The Kiwis, ranked No 1 in the world, have been made aware that they are due out of Manchester within 24 hours of the semifinal against Australia at Elland Road in Leeds. Australia, though, were originally booked on flights out of Manchester following the final at Old Trafford the following week.

Sources with knowledge of tournament logistics told the Sydney Morning Herald that World Cup organisers were forced to predict when teams would be eliminated to put a hold on flights before the start of the event.

News of the early bookings didn’t go down well in the Kiwis camp, although wing Jordan Rapana said he had no concerns because the organisers would ‘‘find out they’ve lost some money when they’re going to have to reschedule it on Saturday’’.

It will cost tournament officials over A$350 (NZ$381) per ticket to change the flights if the Kiwis manage to spring an upset against the reigning champions on Saturday morning (NZT).

The organisers’ pre-emptive move, however, did rankle with Bromwich, although he insisted he and his team-mates have already put it behind them.

‘‘It was pretty disrespectful, I found it, to be published like that,’’ the Kiwis skipper said yesterday. ‘‘It’s not on. . .

‘‘We spoke about that as a group, and we want to control what we can control. Outside noise shouldn’t be affecting us at this time of the tournament. Our preparations should be the main thing on our mind for Friday night at this moment.

‘‘So we’ve put that one to bed,’’ Bromwich said, while admitting a lot of the Kiwis ‘‘found it disrespectful’’.

Bromwich said the Kiwis wouldn’t need to use the bookings brouhaha as a motivating factor, saying there were enough other factors to inspire them against the world champion Australians.

‘‘We found out about it this morning, which was fine,’’ Bromwich said. ‘‘ We used it for a good training session today.

We’ve got enough motivation in this team, enough pride in the jumper . . . we don’t really need too much outside noise.’’