{"id":303324,"date":"2025-11-23T10:37:12","date_gmt":"2025-11-23T10:37:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/303324\/"},"modified":"2025-11-23T10:37:12","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T10:37:12","slug":"sydney-to-host-tonga-samoa-world-cup-blockbuster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/303324\/","title":{"rendered":"Sydney to host Tonga-Samoa World Cup blockbuster"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nov 23, 2025, 01:24 AM ET<\/p>\n

Tonga has been given a tough draw at next year’s Rugby League World Cup, including a showdown with archrivals Samoa at Parramatta.<\/p>\n

Editor’s Picks<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n

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The Kristian Woolf-coached Tongans have been drawn in Group C, which means they play matches against Group B sides England, Samoa and Lebanon.<\/p>\n

Their round three showdown with Samoa on November 1 at CommBank Stadium is set to be a sellout after 44,682 fans watched the Samoans beat Tonga 34-6 at Suncorp Stadium in this year’s Pacific Cup.<\/p>\n

Defending World Cup champions Australia will kick off the 10-nation men’s tournament against Pacific Cup holders and Group A rivals New Zealand on October 15 at Allianz Stadium.<\/p>\n

The Kangaroos, who swept England 3-0 in the recent Ashes series, will then play remaining Group A sides Fiji and the Cook Islands in the following weeks.<\/p>\n

Group A’s four sides play each other once in the three round robin clashes ahead of the semifinals, and the final at Suncorp Stadium on Sunday, Nov. 15.<\/p>\n

The semifinals will be held at Newcastle’s McDonald Jones Stadium and Sydney’s Allianz Stadium.<\/p>\n

Group B and C feature three teams apiece but sides in each will play three games, against those in the opposite group.<\/p>\n

Tonga, PNG and France make up Group B.<\/p>\n

The top two sides from Group A go through to the semi-finals while the six teams in Group B and C will form a ladder of their own with the top two playing semis.<\/p>\n

That makes Tonga’s task, which includes clashes against England in Perth on Oct. 17 and their showdown with Samoa, tougher than any other team’s.<\/p>\n

Tonga has been given a tough draw at next year’s Rugby League World Cup, including a showdown with archrivals Samoa at Parramatta.\u00a0Bradley Kanaris\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

World Cup titles for men, women and wheelchair will be contested in Australia and Papua New Guinea, with 14 nations and 26 teams playing 53 matches across 31 days.<\/p>\n

The Women’s World Cup boasts eight sides with Australia, Samoa, England and Wales in Group A. Group B consists of New Zealand, PNG, France and Fiji.<\/p>\n

Each team will play three matches, against the other teams in their group. The top two teams from each group will progress to the semis.<\/p>\n

Australia and Samoa will open the tournament at CommBank Stadium on Oct. 16.<\/p>\n

The same two-group format applies in the Wheelchair World Cup with England, Ireland, Wales and the USA in Group A and Australia, Scotland, France and New Zealand in Group B.<\/p>\n

All the wheelchair showdowns will be held at Wollongong’s WIN Entertainment Centre.<\/p>\n

Australian Rugby League (ARLC) chairman Peter V’landys said the World Cup would build on the success of both domestic and international rugby league.<\/p>\n

“Rugby League World Cup 2026 couldn’t come at a better time on the back of record-breaking NRL and NRLW seasons, a successful Ashes series, and the most exciting Pacific Championships ever,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Representing your country is the ultimate honour and doing so in a World Cup is the ultimate stage. The talent, skill, physicality, passion and raw emotion on display will be something like we have never seen before.<\/p>\n

“This will be the best and most successful Rugby League World Cup on record.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nov 23, 2025, 01:24 AM ET Tonga has been given a tough draw at next year’s Rugby League…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":303325,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-303324","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303324","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=303324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303324\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/303325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=303324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=303324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=303324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}