Australia to fund rugby league team in sports-mad Papua New Guinea

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Papua New Guinea's Prime Minister James Marape announced on Thursday that a new team based in the Pacific nation will join the National Rugby League competition with funding from Canberra.

Australia will spend US$385 million on the franchise in a move designed to bolster ties of the two countries. Anthony Albanese, Australian Prime Minister said "PNG deserves a national team. The new team will belong to the people of Papua New Guinea. It will call Port Moresby home and I know it will have millions, literally, of proud fans barracking for it from day one. Not just in PNG, but I suspect many Australians as well will adopt the PNG team as theirs. "

Rugby league borders on a national obsession in Papua New Guinea, where adults and children play on muddy fields using plastic bottles stuffed with grass. Promising athletes are snapped up to play professionally in Australia and England.