Pacific Games 2015

Crystal Mari levelled with Lango Vamule Vassy Mata of Vanuatu to win bronze in the female individual kata. Fiji’s Naomi Bakani won silver and Angelique Mondoloni of New Caledonia took the gold.

In the male individual kata, Cosmas Saliawali drew with Noa Lucas of Tahiti to take out bronze while New Caledonia’s Minh Dack grabbed gold and Fiji’s Anthony Yam won silver.

The PNG male team consisting of Saliawali, Lonard Gariadi and Nigel Bana finished third to take out bronze.  New Caledonia demonstrated clever kicks and techniques to grab gold over Fiji who took the  silver.

The third ranking country in the  Pacific islands, Vanuatu,  gave newcomers Tonga an upsetting 20 point margin, winning 21-1.

Vanuatu scored 5 points to Tonga 1 in the first 15 minutes of the match.

The second period of the match saw Vanuatu taking advantage of the inexperienced Tonga side, scoring more to boost the lead  to 15-1.

They maintained their lead with 6 more points in the last 15 minute period, preventing the newcomers who only had 3 months of games preparation from scoring and won the match 21-1.

Matches will continue after lunch. 

Tickets are being sold for K10 per head as Games officials are getting ready to start the most "looked forward to" sports with PNG golden girl Toea Wisil leading the team.

According to athletics officials, PNG will field more than 600 athletes in different fields.

Photo: Hundreds of people lining up to buy tickets this morning  near a stall  close to the BP stadium.

In front of their vocal home crowd, Richard Kilarupa and Moha Mea trashed the Northern Marianas in the first two sets, 21-10 and 21-0 to record their victory.

The beach volleyball competition of the XV Pacific Games got going this morning at the BSP Stadium outer arena.

PNG’s final game for day one will be played at 4pm.

PNG men play Tonga and PNG and American Samoa ladies will go into battle. 

Kaiwi is contesting in the under 90 kg light heavyweight men's division.

The 60 seconds freestyle event is currently underway on stage.

Papua New Guinea"s Jack Viyufa is the favourite for the spectators as he participates in the men's 75 kg heavyweight.

The women's heavyweight competitors strutted their stuff earlier this morning.

Fiji is currently taking on Solomon Islands at the Sir John Guise stadium.

The champions got off to a good start to the match  and are leading 6-1 at half time. 

Beach volleyball is a new sport in Papua New Guinea but seats for this event at the Pacific Games are almost full at the venue.

PNG and Northern Marianas men play on Court 1 and the ladies from New Caledonia and Fiji play at court two 

PNG started strongly taking a 6-0 lead at half time.

Touch downs went to Margret Luke, Marlon Stevens, Kele Lessy and Grace Kouba.

PNG continued their dominance in the second half of play with touch downs scored that included Pauline Arazi and Jenny Carol.

Cook Islands only managed one touchdown to Cahjun Willis.

In other games, Tonga beat Kiribati 10-5.

PNG will play again at 12pm once the draws are finalized.

The medal play offs are scheduled for this afternoon.

He made the comment after the host nation collected four gold and one silver medals in the four events earlier.

Upston said he "felt emotional" because of the effort put into by the lifters.

 He said that he had faith in the power lifters to make the country proud.

"(Lifters) trusted in the programs, believed in themselves and it paid dividend,’’ he said.

 The contracted coach also challenged  the national government to support the code so its potential can be seen.