Winning a World Cup is the final frontier for Payne Haas and he is fully committed to attempting to do so with Samoa.<\/p>\n
There had been reports the Brisbane prop was considering switching back to Australia for the 2026 tournament, but the 26-year-old has quashed those suggestions. <\/p>\n
Haas, who has Samoan heritage through his mother Joan Haas, committed to Toa Samoa for last year’s Pacific Championships after previously playing four Tests with Australia.<\/p>\n
He helped lift Samoa into the Pacific Cup final after starring in a 34-6 win over Tonga.<\/p>\n
The powerhouse front-rower is a man of his word and said there was no way he had considered making himself available for the Kangaroos.<\/p>\n
“I made my decision last year to move to Samoa from Australia,” Haas said.<\/p>\n
“The kind of person I am, I wouldn’t back flip on them. I want to represent my mum, my grandmother and my granddad as well and there is no way in hell that I would (back flip).”<\/p>\n
Haas is already on his way to being recognised as an all-time great, but lifting Samoa to World Cup glory would be a huge achievement and has the potential to raise Pacific rugby league to another level.<\/p>\n
Samoa have been drawn in the same pool as France, Papua New Guinea and Tonga for the 10-team tournament to be hosted by Australia, New Zealand and PNG in October and November this year.<\/p>\n
Haas is a key member of a Samoa forward pack that boasts the likes of Francis Molo, Jaydn Su’A, Simi Sasagi, Junior Paulo and Terrell May.<\/p>\n
The backline includes premiership-winning stars Jarome Luai, Brian To’o and Stephen Crichton. Dolphins flyer Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow has also committed for the World Cup.<\/p>\n
There is a sense the side can go one better than their 2022 World Cup performance, when beaten by Australia in the final.<\/p>\n
“With the kind of calibre of players we have got there is a great chance, but that is still far away,” Haas said.<\/p>\n
“This is my last two months here so I am trying to focus on the Broncs.”<\/p>\n
Last week Haas dominated the State of Origin decider for NSW, terrorising Queensland up front in a stunning 30-12 win. It was his third Origin series win when playing all three matches and his second in a decider at Suncorp Stadium.<\/p>\n
Last year’s premiership win with Brisbane ticked that box and Haas also was named the club’s player of the year for a sixth time.<\/p>\n
He is without doubt the Broncos’ greatest player of the decade and a worthy successor to the likes of Glenn Lazarus, Shane Webcke, Petero Civoniceva and Brad Thorn.<\/p>\n
Haas will join South Sydney next year, but is fully committed to reviving Brisbane’s spluttering season as they target winning all eight of their remaining matches to give themselves a chance of defending their title.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Winning a World Cup is the final frontier for Payne Haas and he is fully committed to attempting…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":523680,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[111,139,577,69,6430,213],"class_list":["post-523679","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nrl","tag-nz","tag-pacific-islands","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=523679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523679\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/523680"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=523679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=523679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=523679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}