{"id":532928,"date":"2026-03-11T09:00:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T09:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/532928\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T09:00:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T09:00:10","slug":"wests-tigers-prodigy-says-switch-to-rugby-union-is-100-per-cent-an-option","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/532928\/","title":{"rendered":"Wests Tigers prodigy says switch to rugby union is \u201c100 per cent\u201d an option"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cComing from rugby it would be good to go back,\u201d he said. \u201c100 per cent it\u2019s an option. But my passion is with rugby league right now. I want to finish my goals first. I\u2019ll see what happens down the track \u2026 I\u2019ll [focus] on rugby league, but if there\u2019s any other opportunity, my manager will take care of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Makasini\u2019s father, Mosese, represented Tonga in rugby and played in the Sydney club rugby premiership, the Shute Shield. When former Wallabies coach Robbie Deans tried to lure his son to Japanese rugby and the Waratahs were also interested in his services, Mosese encouraged him to pursue rugby union.<\/p>\n

\"Heamasi<\/p>\n

Heamasi Makasini has a bright future ahead of him.Credit: NRL Photos<\/p>\n

\u201cHis dream was always seeing me in a Wallabies jersey,\u201d Makasini said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe said to me at the end of the day, it\u2019s my decision, so he was kind of happy both ways.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are no regrets about his decision to opt for league, but admits it was a \u201cpretty close decision\u201d.<\/p>\n

Loading<\/p>\n

\u201cThe week before I signed with Tigers, I just finished coming from Australian Schoolboys in New Zealand,\u201d he said. \u201cBeating New Zealand over in New Zealand, that was kind of a special moment for myself and a special memory as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s where things kind of go hard, whether to choose union or league. Obviously just playing union more than league throughout that season, my heart, my mind was leaning towards union.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut then I was just thinking about the Tigers, they were building special things and I just wanted to be a part of it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cComing from rugby it would be good to go back,\u201d he said. \u201c100 per cent it\u2019s an option.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":532929,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-532928","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\/532928","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=532928"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532928\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/532929"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=532928"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=532928"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=532928"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}