Squad head to Monaco

THE national women’s sevens rugby union team departed for Monaco on Saturday following a delay caused by a squad member testing positive for Covid-19, according to Papua New Guinea Rugby Union. The squad member has remained in PNG as the Palais look to secure a top-two finish in this weekend’s World Rugby Sevens Repechage which is an Olympic qualifier. Palais strength and conditioning coach John Tekwie said he was confident about the team’s training and preparations despite the difficulties caused by the pandemic. He was appointed last November to assist the Palais while head coach Paul Tietjens was based in New Zealand, remotely coaching the squad. Tekwie told The National on Thursday that preparations for the Palais had not been easy, especially with the Covid-19 restrictions and closure of sporting venues which had forced them to look for alternate facilities.  “We were training six sessions a day at Bava Park,” he said. “We had three morning and as many afternoon sessions where we did our strength work at the high performance centre. “When that was locked down (due to the Covid-19 restrictions), we had to look for other places to do our strength work. “That’s where some of our rugby executives stepped in and organised for us to use their own private facilities to do our strength work. “The most important challenge was keeping them (the players) mentally focused and still having that love and passion for the sport. “From what I know, the girls haven’t played any in-house competitions in almost two years because of Covid-19.  “It’s very hard to keep training and not have any challenge or game at the end of the week, so they lose motivation and focus, but I always try to remind them why they are here in the first place.”