Plans revealed for a Pacific Island Super Rugby team

The Pacific Islands are one step closer to having a Super Rugby team after a group of investors offered US$4.5-million to have an independent Hawaii-based team in Super Rugby from 2020.

The concept is designed to counter the drain of talented players from the islands to other rugby-playing nations like New Zealand and Australia.

The team would be made up of players exclusively from Fiji, Samoa and Tonga. The benefactors are a group of Pacific Islanders playing in America’s NFL, but their funding comes with the condition that the team is based in Hawaii.

The investment offered does fall short of the reported US$12 million that would be required each year for the team to be considered as part of an expanded Super Rugby competition but the proposed investment is a step in the right direction. 

Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi, Samoa prime minister and chairman of the Samoa Rugby Union, says negotiations between all the parties involved are well underway.

‘We have a good Samaritan, the organisation of Pacific Players playing for the American sports who are interested in funding a Super Rugby team, and I think that is an opening for our Pacific team, but it will have to be based in Hawaii,’ he said.

‘We are still continuing the discussion, if the Hawaiian solutions come through then we will have a Super Rugby team. Otherwise, we are talking about issues that we can never, never, never finance because we cannot afford it.’

Story via: Radio.NZ