Ase Boas

Coach Michael Marum announced this before their flight to Sydney yesterday.

Macdonald suffered the injury following the Dragons’ 32-8 win over the Manly Sea Eagles over the weekend.

Ase joins the Kumuls squad, which now has 10 PNG Hunters.

(Ase Boas filepic)

Boas signed a 12-month contract with Nasfund as the superannuation institution profiled its voluntary contributions product in Port Moresby yesterday (April 26).

Chief of member services, Charlie Gilichibi, said Nasfund is pleased to have this association with Ase Boas and the PNG Hunters to profile and grow this product.

The Hunters attended the PNG Christian Fellowship at Gerehu to dedicate the year 2018 to God in prayer.

It had also been an all too long, hard year for the players back in 2017 after they returned home to celebrate their victory in the Intrust Super Cup but also later losing one of their own, Kato Ottio, during one of their usual trainings.

“I try to take the guys out of rugby as they also need to be spiritually fit,” says SP Hunters captain Ase Boas during the service.

There have been worrying signs for the Hunters captain who has been in pre-season training wearing a cast on his right hand.

“He had an accident in Kokopo after the Rugby League World Cup. His doctor has been working with him and will probably remove the cast this week and hopefully he (Ase) can start doing his contact work next week,” said Marum.

Marum added there is still time for Boas to recover before next month’s trial match against the Brisbane Broncos on the 24^th at the National Football Stadium, Port Moresby.

Hunters Captain Ase Boas read a very touching and meaningful poem from the Hunters camp, solely dedicated to their late teammate – Kato Ottio.

Speaking at the funeral service today, Boas struggled to hold back tears, describing Ottio as a “great friend of humble character”.

An emotional Boas also relayed condolences from current Kumuls captain, David Mead, who was unable to make it to the funeral.

Boas, who is the vice captain of the Kumuls, spoke of how he knew Ottio personally, saying he was a real “mummy's boy”.

A welcome ceremony has been planned at the Airport Ceremonial Park.

The Hunters will arrive on an Air Niugini flight PX 004 from Brisbane, Australia.

The SP Hunters made history on Sunday afternoon-beating the Sunshine Coast Falcons 12-10 in the Intrust Super Grand final at Suncorp Stadium, Australia.

The win was sealed two minutes out from full time with a try from Willie Minoga off an Ase Boas grubber.

Boas took out the honours at the annual QRL Awards last night at the Royal International Convention Centre in Brisbane, Australia.

The scoring whizz edged out Redcliffe Dolphins Matt Lodge, Central Queensland Capras Krys Freeman, Easts Tigers Brodie Croft and Ipswich Jets Michael Purcell.

But that wasn’t all, Boas also scooped up the People’s Choice award, which is voted for by the fans.

Ever since entering the Intrust Super Cup competition in 2014, the Hunters have won the award four years in a row.

Captain of the PNG Hunters Ase Boas says that this is a sad reality that many face.

Boas and his team mates took part in a recent financial literacy training given by Digicel PNG.

The training focused on being money smart and ways to enable simple saving measures.

Facilitated by the Digicel Learning center, the one day training which was broken up into two separate sessions for the team helped the team to be more money minded in their approach to saving and spending.

Boas goes up against 13 other nominees, which include his Kumuls teammates and former Hunters players, Justin Olam, who is the 2017 nominee for the Sunshine Coast Falcons, and Thompson Teteh for the Redcliffe Dolphins.

To learn more about the nominees and to submit your vote, visit this page on the QRL website: http://www.qrl.com.au/intrust-super-cup/xxxx-peoples-choice-award.html