{"id":632039,"date":"2026-04-26T12:55:24","date_gmt":"2026-04-26T12:55:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/632039\/"},"modified":"2026-04-26T12:55:24","modified_gmt":"2026-04-26T12:55:24","slug":"nrl-news-2026-jarome-luai-spotted-in-png-discussions-with-chiefs-wests-tigers-contract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/632039\/","title":{"rendered":"NRL news 2026 | Jarome Luai spotted in PNG, discussions with Chiefs, Wests Tigers contract"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tigers half Jarome Luai<\/a> has been spotted in Papua New Guinea<\/a> as the Chiefs embark on a bid to lure him as the club’s marquee signing.<\/p>\n

Luai has a yearly option in his contract<\/a> at the Tigers despite being signed until the end of 2029 on a $1.2 million-a-season deal.<\/p>\n

Nine’s Danny Weidler reported that Luai toured around Port Moresby with Chiefs CEO Lorna McPherson and general manager Michael Chammas.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Bellamy slams ’embarrassing’ Storm after sheds walkout<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE: Lomax’s next step revealed on road to World Cup<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE: Red cards for hair-pulling star, furious coach<\/a><\/p>\n

PNG publication, Post Courier, posted footage of Luai at Sir John Guise Stadium for a Digicel ExxonMobil Cup double-header match.<\/p>\n

Watch the 2026 NRL season live and free on Nine and 9Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Chammas was spotted next to Luai as the five-eighth waved to the crowd.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Michael Chammas (left) and Jarome Luai (right).\u00a0Post-Courier<\/p>\n

The Sydney Morning Herald<\/a> reports Luai has until April 30 to take up an option to stay with Tigers for next season. The Chiefs don’t enter the competition until 2028.<\/p>\n

If Luai was to depart the Tigers for the Chiefs in 2028 it would mean he only played three years of a five-year deal at the joint venture.<\/p>\n

Previous Tigers CEO Shane Richardson had repeatedly claimed that Luai told him his motivation to join the club was “all about the (premiership) rings”. <\/p>\n

The Chiefs are yet to sign any players but it’s highly likely Kumuls representative Alex Johnston will be one of the first to sign.<\/p>\n

\"TOWNSVILLE,<\/p>\n

Jarome Luai.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

Toby Rudolf has expressed interest in playing for Papua New Guinea, and is off-contract this season.<\/p>\n

The allure of tax-free contracts will entice a lot of players and Broncos lock Patrick Carrigan has previously refused to rule out a move either. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tigers half Jarome Luai has been spotted in Papua New Guinea as the Chiefs embark on a bid…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":632040,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-632039","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\/632039","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=632039"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/632039\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/632040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=632039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=632039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=632039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}