This is a more realistic option

 IT is said a journey begins with the first step. So it is congratulations to the Papua New Guinea Rugby Football League, the government and supporting corporate partners for pushing for, and gaining acceptance into the Queensland Cup competition. 

From lofty ambitions of having a team in the National Rugby League – as the initial 2008 plan was – to the more realistic option of entering the Q-Cup as a precursor to eventually making the NRL, rugby league in PNG will finally take its first tangible step to its ultimate goal. 

Too often Papua New Guinean fans and administrators have been too quick to buy into the hype and not ask the hard questions about the reality of a PNG-based NRL team. 

Just like the recently completed Rugby League World Cup, we may have expected too much from the quality of players and the management. 

Many pundits in Australia contend that an NRL team from this country is years and perhaps decades away at best. They charge that PNG does not have the infrastructure, the refined playing talent or the administrative and technical experience to bring a team into what is still the world’s best rugby league competition.  

PNG rugby league can only do so much, but what it does must be effective and part of an overall strategy. 

Having a team in the Intrust Super Cup (Q-Cup), at a yearly cost of K6 million, in 2014 and for the next four years is the foothold needed to go onto to greater things. 

It will not be easy and success may not be an automatic outcome. 

The Queensland competition serves as a holding pen for fringe NRL talent and a breeding ground for the next generation of players.

Players like Cameron Smith, Billy Slater, Cooper Cronk, Nate Myles and Matt Gillett have spent time in the Q-Cup or were spotted playing in that competition.   It will be a much harder tester for PNG’s elite talent than the Digicel Cup.  In the end that is what our players crave. Kumul Richard Kambo made the comment recently that he thought the country’s best needed something more than what they were getting even in the best local competition. 

“Why not send players overseas? We need a weekly grind against tough competition so that we are competitive in test matches and international games,” Kambo said.  

At least one Digicel Cup coach does not think so. The coach, who spoke off the record, said he was concerned that the Digicel Cup would actually be negatively affected by PNG’s participation in the ISC. 

“We have a competition that can be as good as the Queensland Cup. The Gurias showed that this year when they beat the Northern Pride in Townsville. This shows we have the talent and coaching that can compete with Queensland sides.” 

The coach said PNG’s Queensland Cup team would invariably “suck up” all the top talent from the Digicel Cup franchises and dilute the local competition. 

These are legitimate concerns but no one knows for sure what will happen. 

A 53-member squad has been named and this is the basically the extended Kumuls squad. 

All these players play for Digicel Cup sides so it is within reason that to think that local teams will have to go without some of their top players throughout the season. The Q-Cup starts in March; the Digicel Cup normally gets under way in April. 

There will be clashes in scheduling and fans might be forced to decide whether to watch their local team or the “national” side on a bi-weekly basis. It might not be desirable arrangement for some (and these are in the minority) but in the bigger picture the need to make that first step on the journey to the NRL dream supersedes all concerns.