Pukpuks climb world rankings

 By KYMLIE KARANI

PAPUA New Guinea could break into the world’s top 50 if they win the Oceania Cup to be played in Port Moresby in July.

That comes following the latest International Rugby Board rankings showing PNG climbing one place from 52nd to 51st.

This year’s Oceania Cup will feature the Cook Islands, Niue, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Tahiti and American Samoa trying to dethrone the Pukpuks.

The jump up a spot follows five matches over the weekend – four of them Rugby World Cup 2015 qualifiers – but only one resulted in any positional changes to the IRB world rankings with Lithuania climbing two places to 46th after edging Croatia 15-14 in Division 2A of the European Nations Cup.

Israel, Malta, Papua New Guinea and the Czech Republic are the beneficiaries of Croatia’s fall.

The winner of the Oceania Cup, which is the regional qualifiers for the 2015 Rugby World Cup, will move on to play Fiji who are ranked 13th in the world.

The PNG national 15s (Monier Pukpuks) side is undergoing an Australian Rugby Union (ARU) high performance unit camp on the Gold Coast to help stack the team in preparation for the Oceania Cup.