Touch football set for World Cup

By JAMIE HARO
TOUCH football in Papua New Guinea has set a benchmark for all team sports by producing a podium finish at the World Cup level and ranked among the top 10.
This year, seven divisions consisting of the open divisions (men, women and mixed), 35 men’s, 40 men’s, 40 women’s and 45 men’s will send their best athletes to the World Cup set for July in Nottingham, England.
The code was introduced into the country in 1984 where it was only played then in Port Moresby and later expanding to Lae and Rabaul.
PNG’s first World Cup appearance was in 1988 where the inaugural World Cup was held in Australia.
After establishing an association and then attending the first world cup, PNG started actively participating in the several world events including the 1991 World Cup in Auckland, New Zealand, then to Hawaii in the United States of America in 1995 and the 1999 games in Sydney, Australia.
Between 1999 and 2011 the national team made no appearances at three world cups held in Kumagaya, Japan (2003), Stellenbosch in South Africa (2007) and Edinburgh in Scotland (2011) until their reappearance in the 2015 edition in Coffs Harbor, New South Wales, Australia.
Returning to the international stage after 16 years with no world ranking, PNG’s open men’s and open mix divisions each made history when they defeated South Africa 8-7 and England 11-8 respectively to claim the country’s first two World Cup bronze medals.
The national team then made another appearance at the 2019 World Cup in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Another outstanding performance was made by the open men’s team despite losing against Japan 5-2 in the Bronze medal playoff.
This year’s World Cup is likely to see a few veterans make their final appearances in the open divisions before switching into the senior divisions.
PNG has dominated in the last three Pacific Games winning back-to-back gold medals in 2015 and 2019 in the open men’s, women’s and mixed divisions. They lost all three titles in the gold medal playoff to Samoa in the 2023 Pacific Games to settle for silver medals, however the world stage will yet again test their limits as they compete against the world’s best once more. All eyes will be on the open men’s team as they’ve been placed in a pool of 10 with reigning World Cup champions Australia and their Pacific Games rivals Samoa among home side England, France, Hong Kong (China), Lebanon, Oman, Scotland and USA.
Meanwhile, a final 16-man squad for all divisions will be announced in due time.