{"id":218405,"date":"2025-10-16T19:02:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T19:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/218405\/"},"modified":"2025-10-16T19:02:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-16T19:02:09","slug":"dolphins-winger-chooses-kiwis-over-samoa-for-pacific-championships-due-to-fathers-advice-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/218405\/","title":{"rendered":"Dolphins winger chooses Kiwis over Samoa for Pacific Championships due to father\u2019s advice"},"content":{"rendered":"

Will Origin changes take place?<\/p>\n

Debate raged this year regarding how international and State of Origin guidelines would coincide, with the 2025 Samoan and Tongan squads boasting eight men who played for Queensland and New South Wales.<\/p>\n

Players can feature in the interstate rivalry if they have only represented tier two countries such as the pacific island nations, while those who have lined up for New Zealand or England can not.<\/p>\n

\"Jason<\/p>\n

Jason Taumalolo of Tonga is tackledCredit: Getty Images<\/p>\n

For instance, Tongan skipper Jason Taumalolo moved from to Townsville when he was 12, yet because he played for the Kiwis cannot do the same for Queensland.<\/p>\n

Loading<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Dolphins forward Kulikefu Finefeuiaki moved from Auckland to Ipswich when he was 11, yet since he has not represented the nation of his birth can play for both Tonga and the Maroons.<\/p>\n

Origin eligibility guideline changes have been floated to allow players of dual-heritage to feature, provided they played junior rugby league in the respective states before the age of 13.<\/p>\n

\u201cGrowing up in Queensland, I had this sense of belonging and passion and genuine hate \u2013 I don\u2019t know for what reason \u2013 for the New South Wales boys,\u201d Tonga and former Kangaroos and Queensland forward Felise Kaufusi told this masthead.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got that sense of belonging growing up in Queensland and having pride in our jumper and regional towns \u2026 and then I\u2019ve been lucky enough to grow up in a Tongan household where I heard stories of how tough it was growing up.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the pull of my emotions bringing out how tough they had it … to be able to lift Tonga on the world stage, and that was on the back of Taumalolo and the guys who deferred away earlier.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey started that, and we\u2019re starting to see as a nation the younger generation coming through and aspiring to play for Tonga.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shifting allegiances<\/p>\n

Haas\u2019 move from Kangaroos certainty to Samoan leader was arguably the biggest since Andrew Fifita and Taumalolo announced they would feature for Tonga in 2017.<\/p>\n

The decision had a \u201cspecial\u201d impact on Finefeuiaki, who spoke of his desire to also represent Samoa.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m half-Samoan because of my mum, but I grew up on my dad\u2019s side more than my mum\u2019s side. I can speak both, I can understand both, but I love each,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen it comes to those games [Tonga v Samoa] \u2026 I just go for the ref because I don\u2019t want to start any fights in the house. I hope I get to represent both nations down the track.\u201d<\/p>\n

While tier one defections have strengthened competition ahead of the 2026 World Cup \u2013 with only Australia (12), Great Britain (three) and New Zealand (one) winning the tournament \u2013 it does pose a question of where the buck stops.<\/p>\n

While Tongan and Gold Coast prop Moeaki Fotuaika believed proudly both sides of one\u2019s heritage should be acceptable \u2013 declaring \u201cit\u2019d be good for your parents, that\u2019s my outlook\u201d \u2013 Maroons coach Billy Slater stressed \u201cchopping and changing\u201d must be avoided.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe one thing we don\u2019t want is one year they\u2019re playing for Samoa, the next year they\u2019re coming back and playing for Australia,\u201d he said on Nine\u2019s Sunday Footy Show after Haas\u2019 defection.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think they need to make a decision and stick with it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Will Origin changes take place? Debate raged this year regarding how international and State of Origin guidelines would…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":218406,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-218405","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nrl","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-national-rugby-league","11":"tag-nationalrugbyleague","12":"tag-nrl","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218405","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218405"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218405\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/218406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}