Pacific Games 2015

Fiji thrash PNG 17-0 in Rugby 7s

Fiji opened the scoring through Savenaca Rawaca to take a 5-0 lead in the opening minutes of play.

PNG struggled to keep up with a much bigger and faster Fiji pack and soon the visitors were in again to score through Isake Katonibau. A successful conversion brought the score to 12-0 going into half time.

PNG improved on their defence in the second half of play only conceding one late try right on full time. This was scored on the wing by Fiji’s Atunaisa Abele.

In their other matches for today, PNG will play Tahiti at 5:30pm and and Guam at 8:30pm.

Fiji, Tahiti qualify for soccer Semis

Tahiti were reduced to nine players in the second half after captain Manuarii Hauata and Thibaut Pito received two bookings and were sent off.

Tahiti head coach Patrice Flaccadori was pleased with his team’s spirit in holding out for the draw.

“It was a very tough game against a good team. I think the score is fair, but I am angry because we received two red cards and I found the referee’s decisions very hard,” said Flaccadori.

Pini candidate for athlete’s representative

Hanisi Visanti, the administrative officer to the Oceania National Olympic Committee, said the trio are candidates to represent the athletes on council and current she and her team are conducting a secret ballot based with education.

Visanti said the 2015 Pacific Games is not about playing sports and winning medals, there is education and leadership mentoring done by the Oceania National Olympic Committee and athletes are casting their ballots for who they think should represent them.

The President of the Pacific Games Council Vidhya Lakhan is a very happy man right now.

Lakhan, who is also based in Fiji, said outside of the PNG Power Dome BSP Arena, that he was so happy that since the official opening of the Pacific Games, it has been "so far so good".

"It’s been good since the official opening and I thank the people of PNG and the organizers and the Government," he said.

Team Australia and Team New Zealand also told Post-Courier briefly that the event was excellent as they can truly saw the Pacific spirit.

"We can see true sportsmanship, the Pacific spirit and the friendly spirit of our pacific leaders," the Australians said.

Cook Island paddler Hunter gathering va’a momentum at Port Moresby 2015

Hunter, one of the Cook Islands’ top-ranked athletes in the discipline, believes the Pacific Games are as good as it gets for paddlers because va’a – or outrigger canoeing as it is also known – is not an Olympic sport.

“For us, this is the big event. This is basically it. We all want to win here,” said Hunter, who used to compete internationally in triathlon.

Hunter won the bronze medal in the women’s V1 500m race on Tuesday and will also be competing in the V1 10km on Friday and V6 20km on Saturday.

Weightlifting: now to the heavies!

The 105kg men's division will kick start the day’s activities.

Gashe Heni is the only Papua New Guinean competing.

The favorite for the event is Australian Zac Grgure.

A short time ago, the seats were 95 percent empty but spectators are slowly moving in.

The snatch category of the 105kg competition will start shortly.

PNG shooter wins gold after only 10 months

PNG took out gold and silver in the 25m pistol event.

PNG Loop’s Head of Mobile Advertising and Media Sales Tania Mahuru won gold while silver went to PNG’s Mel Donald and a  Tahiti shooter took bronze.

Mahuru has been in the sport for only 10 months.  She told PNG Loop that her win as a big achievement considering that.

The enthusiastic Mahuru said she took up the sport just for fun and didn’t think she would get this far.

“I kept coming every weekend and got better and eventually made the development squad and the Pacific Games team,” she said.

PNG touch women slam Samoa, 6-2

PNG dominated the second half, scoring four more touch downs to bring home the win.

All 6 touch downs were scored by captain Diane Vetu and Nadya Taubuso.

PNG were undefeated, winning all their round robin games and into the finals as well.

In the bronze medal play off, Cooks Islands did it easily over Kiribati, winning 11-2.

Catholic Church urges fair play in games

General secretary Father Victor Roche, SVD,  said as the games move into full swing, it is good seeing sports men and women of ‘wan solwara’ participate in the spirit of sportsmanship.

“It is good to win medals. But it is participation that matters most and not winning alone. In sports, losers are also winners. Fair play is appreciated by all,” he said.

He urged residents of Port Moresby to take heed of the opportunity to show to the world that PNG is a sport loving and peace loving nation.

Swimmer disqualified over kicks

Despite swimming a qualifying time of 2:49:59 sec, Vali-Skelton was disqualified for making two dolphin kicks before going into breaststroke after she made her turn.

This was confirmed by official Sue Babao.

Vali-Skelton’s time was the fourth fastest in this event.

Her team mates Savannah Tkatchenko (2:42:18 sec) and Tegan McCarthy (2:50:84) have qualified for the finals this evening.