{"id":697824,"date":"2026-05-27T12:16:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T12:16:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/697824\/"},"modified":"2026-05-27T12:16:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T12:16:09","slug":"nz-rugby-to-cover-moana-pasifika-player-salaries-as-franchise-fights-for-future-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/697824\/","title":{"rendered":"NZ Rugby to cover Moana Pasifika player salaries as franchise fights for future"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">Coach Fa\u2019alogo Tana Umaga said among all the questions and uncertainty, having their salaries paid for the next two months was a significant relief.<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cGetting that news, it was met with a bit of applause. We\u2019re very thankful to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/sport\/rugby\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/sport\/rugby\/\">New Zealand Rugby<\/a> for stepping in at this time. <\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cHaving that certainty now, and being able to put some food on the table for the next couple of weeks. We\u2019ll take what we can at this stage. It\u2019s better than nothing and it is the reality of the situation we\u2019re in.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">A slew of rumours have been floating around regarding rescue efforts, including the Kanaloa Consortium which is reported to be headed by former All Blacks Jerome Kaino and Joe Rokocoko.<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cI haven\u2019t spoken to them, but if it eventuates, you\u2019ve got two legends of the game that have a deep understanding around Pacific and what they want to do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">Kanaloa Consortium and the Pacific Rugby Players association said on Tuesday the tender process is still ongoing and they hoped discussions would be finalised soon.<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">Despite weeks of emotional turmoil, Umaga said the squad still lives in hope that the franchise will be rescued.<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cYou\u2019ve got to have some confidence. There\u2019s hope and when there\u2019s hope, there\u2019s a way. <\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cThere\u2019s some good people hopefully putting things together to see what the future holds. We have to have hope. Otherwise, you\u2019ll be living in the rain for most of your life and clouds will be grey.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">But is living in hope hurting the players?<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cI don\u2019t think it will damage them at all. For those that can\u2019t find something, then there is a little bit of hope. It could possibly give them another option that they might not have. <\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cIt\u2019s not going to be the same for everybody. It\u2019s the way you look at this, instead of thinking \u2018why me?\u2019, maybe just asking \u2018what have I learned from this?\u2019 and being grateful for the opportunity that we had. <\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cThen \u2018how can I build from this if this is something that I want to get into? Maybe I\u2019ve got to keep working hard at it and then things will happen?\u2019.\u201c<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">The side has endured a miserable season on the field, winless since the opening round and anchored to the bottom of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/topic\/moana-pasifika\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/topic\/moana-pasifika\/\">Super Rugby Pacific ladder<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cThere is disappointment. I think we\u2019ve gone past that stage now. We\u2019re just looking forward to playing well in our last game.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"rGEveXCr\" style=\"display:none\">&#8211; RNZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Coach Fa\u2019alogo Tana Umaga said among all the questions and uncertainty, having their salaries paid for the next&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":697825,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[10960,64,63,4156,319602,38022,580,10967,21503,319601,116476,1697,193050,15624,760,17111,85,319],"class_list":["post-697824","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-as","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cover","tag-dine","tag-fights","tag-for","tag-franchise","tag-future","tag-jonty","tag-moana","tag-nz","tag-pasifika","tag-player","tag-rugby","tag-salaries","tag-sports","tag-to"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/697824","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=697824"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/697824\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/697825"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=697824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=697824"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=697824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}