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\n Dylan Brown and Kieran Foran embrace.
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Dylan Brown could never have predicted his rugby league season would end this way – helping to lead the Kiwis to their second Pacific Cup title.<\/p>\n
In-and-mostly-out of the Parramatta Eels line-up this season, Brown roared to life to win three consecutive player-of-the-match gongs as New Zealand took down Samoa twice and Tonga once to claim the crown.<\/p>\n
Playing at five-eighth alongside Kieran Foran in his final games of rugby league, Brown thrived in the Kiwi environment, staking an undeniable claim for the 2025 Golden Boot award<\/p>\n
\u201cThe feeling is awesome,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been a long year\u2026 but the boys connection pulled us through and we really enjoyed that one.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think interesting is actually a good word for (describing the past season).<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of people are saying it’s like been a bad year or this and that, but I think interesting’s pretty true.<\/p>\n
\u201cI’ve learnt a lot, played centre, I’ve played hooker, I’ve been dropped from an NRL team \u2026 but all you can do is just continue to learn and like we just talked about, a good highlight is obviously winning this.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just really enjoyed my footy the last three games – it\u2019s been awesome.<\/p>\n
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All the emotions: Kieran Foran chats post game<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I got the phone call from Stacey (Jones), he actually asked me if I was keen on Kiwis and for me, it’s never a question.<\/p>\n
\u201cI’m always going to be willing to play for my country no matter how I feel and it’s been awesome.<\/p>\n
\u201cHonestly if I didn\u2019t play, I would have been really disappointed with myself.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlaying for your country, there’s no better feeling.<\/p>\n
\u201cI’m not someone that celebrates tries too often but when you’re playing in the black jersey, it just sort of just takes you over.<\/p>\n
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\n Dylan Brown and Kieran Foran embrace.
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\u201cI think after that win, it’s gives us a lot of confidence.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s going to be a good World Cup next year.\u201d<\/p>\n
While much of the pre-tournament hype surrounded the Tonga and Samoa teams, Jones and his Kiwi side were quietly confident about what they could achieve.<\/p>\n
\u201cHonestly I feel like it was good for us, there was no pressure on us,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe ourselves expected to win, regardless of what other people are saying.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have an expectation that we’re the best in the world, and that’s something that ‘Fish’ (co-captain James Fisher Harris) drives the most.<\/p>\n
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Kiwis v Toa Samoa – Final, 2025<\/p>\n
\u201cHe’s one of the best players in the world, and when you’ve got someone talking about that, it’s pretty easy for you to follow.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe truly believe that and we’re going to come in hot.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like it’s going to be good for the World Cup as well.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can’t wait for next year.\u201d<\/p>\n
With the tournament success under his belt, Brown was looking forward to a good season ahead at his new home in Newcastle, with the confirmation of his switch of clubs to the Knights being announced early in the 2025 season.<\/p>\n
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\n ![\"Dylan](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/80055131_brownd-_251109_ak_00143_202511916362.jpg\"\/)
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\n Dylan Brown in action in the final against Samoa.
\n \u00a9Anthony Kourembanas \/ NRL Images
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\u201cI’m not going to lie, I was nervous moving up to Newcastle; I’ve lived in Parramatta for 10 years,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I’ve been up there for five weeks now and I absolutely love it, it’s a great town.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe interactions that I’ve had have been really wholesome, just a simple \u2018hey, welcome, welcome to Newcastle\u2019, welcome to God’s country they call it, and it’s really nice.<\/p>\n
\u201cI’m happy I get to skip a few weeks of pre-season because that’s tough, but my partner’s pregnant, so we’re going to be having a baby very soon, so no doubt I’ll be in training pretty early.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dylan Brown could never have predicted his rugby league season would end this way – helping to lead…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":275548,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-275547","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\/275547","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=275547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275547\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/275548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=275547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=275547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=275547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}