{"id":801239,"date":"2026-07-15T05:46:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T05:46:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/801239\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T05:46:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T05:46:12","slug":"png-chiefs-table-offer-to-zac-lomax","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/801239\/","title":{"rendered":"PNG Chiefs table offer to Zac Lomax"},"content":{"rendered":"

The NRL’s 19th team, the PNG Chiefs<\/a>, has tabled an offer to Zac Lomax<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Channel Nine and The Daily Telegraph reported that the PNG Chiefs<\/a> have met with Lomax, and he is seriously thinking of a return to rugby league.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Currently, he is on a two-year deal with the Western Force, joining the Western Australian side in early March this year after the court proceedings between the Parramatta Eels<\/a> and the Melbourne Storm<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Lomax wanted to honour the Western Force contract and has aspirations of being selected for the Wallabies Rugby Union World Cup side next year; however, the Chiefs are hoping to entice him to play rugby league again.<\/p>\n

The former Eels and Dragons star recently denied the Melbourne Storm’s offer to join their side in 2027<\/a>, in what would have been a swap deal, with the Eels receiving Jack Howarth<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Parramatta Eels<\/a> have the NRL<\/a> playing rights of Zac Lomax<\/a> until October 31 next year, after agreeing in court to reduce the length from October 31, 2028, to one year earlier.<\/p>\n

\"NRLSYDNEY, AUSTRALIA – MARCH 16: Zac Lomax preparing to take a run during the round two NRL match between Parramatta Eels and Wests Tigers at CommBank Stadium, on March 16, 2025, in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Joshua Davis\/Zero Digital Sports)<\/p>\n

If he were to sign with the PNG Chiefs<\/a>, the rights would have to be waived, which the Eels are willing to do according to reports of the Lomax-Howarth swap.<\/p>\n

He would join Alex Johnston<\/a>, Jarome Luai<\/a>, Matty Lees<\/a> and Connor Watson<\/a> as star recruits before an all-out assault on the open market from November 1, when they can talk to players in the NRL<\/a> with 12 months remaining on their contracts.<\/p>\n

Lomax could play his eighth season in the NRL<\/a> and reach the 150 career game mark, after having already played 133 between the Eels and Dragons.<\/p>\n

Before joining the Parramatta Eels<\/a> in 2025, he requested a release from the St George Illawarra Dragons<\/a> contract, where he was signed until the end of 2026.<\/p>\n

Then, after one season of a four-year deal that would have finished at the end of the 2028 season with the Eels, he requested a release in October and was officially released in November last year.<\/p>\n

Melbourne didn’t want to trade Jack Howarth<\/a> to the Eels in March as they wanted a suitable replacement.<\/p>\n

Now, Howarth’s future is in limbo after his management was granted permission to look around at rival clubs’ offers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The NRL’s 19th team, the PNG Chiefs, has tabled an offer to Zac Lomax. Channel Nine and The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":250550,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-801239","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\/801239","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=801239"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/801239\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/250550"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=801239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=801239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=801239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}