Barras in South Island

 THE Papua New Guinea Barramundis landed in Christchurch, New Zealand, on Tuesday night in preparation for the World Cup Qualifiers.

With a lot at stake for this tournament the Hebou-sponsored Barras wasted no time in getting up to speed with the conditions.

They completed their second day of training today working on fine tuning their skills before taking on Scotland tomorrow morning in their first warm-up match of the tournament.

They then take on Hong Kong in their final practice match on Saturday out at Burwood Park.

Following the practice matches the Barras will then fly to New Plymouth where they will play three of their four pool matches with Kenya being their first hurdle on Monday 13th Jan.

PNG then take on fellow African nation, Uganda (Jan 16) followed by Netherlands (Jan 19) both at Pukekura Park in New Plymouth. 

They will then travel to Tauranga where they take on Namibia in their final pool match.

Barramundis coach, Peter Anderson was happy with how the guys had trained over the last two days.

“Am very happy with the way our boys trained. There was a lot of energy and confidence around the group today. 

Also a big change coming from a hot and humid POM to a cold New Zealand weather but the boys are adapting very well”. “Am keen to get off to a good start in the tournament and it starts with our practice match tomorrow. Hopefully we have some momentum leading into the pool matches.  Everyone’s fully fit and raring to go. Time to trust our preparation now,” Anderson said.

The Barramundis: Chris Amini (c) Jack Vare (v/c) Assad Vala, Tony Ura, Vani Vagi Morea, Geraint Jones, Chris Kent, Raymond Haoda Jr, Willie Gavera, Charles Amini Jr, Mahuru Dai, Lega Siaka, Norman Vanua, Pipi Raho, Jason Kila.