‘The most powerful thing’: How Tonga Rugby grew from one-team wonder to booming cultural community ahead of Pacific Youth Rugby Festival
A small but mighty club on the Gold Coast has returned for the 2024 Pacific Youth Rugby Festival with five times the enforcements of its 2023 campaign, and a motto aimed at building a community full of culture. Full story:
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Tonga Rugby stunned crowds at last year’s Pacific Youth Rugby festival when it’s maiden team of Under-10s lined up for the first time and blitz the competition - going undefeated to win.
Twelve months on, the small but mighty club has returned with enforcements five times that of 2023, and a motto that you don’t need to be Tongan to be family.
“It’s just got to do with our community,’ President Tonga Leaatoa said.
“It may be a Tongan-themed team, but at the end of the day, we’re a group of people from all cultures and we want to keep creating that environment where … we don’t care where you’re from.
“I’m a proud Tongan man, but every culture brings something unique to the table.
“We go off our four virtues of humility, honesty, community and respect in the Tongan way.”
The club has welcomed athletes from Gold Coast, Brisbane and Ipswich as well as from Central Queensland and New South Wales.
Success from last year’s Under-10s was certainly a driving force for promoting more teams this year, and Leaatoa said he was thrilled to see the program grow from one team to five including boys and girls.
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“It’s just great that people want to be a part of what I’m hoping is a great product and a great community,” he said.
“After the success of last year, we had to do trials for the first time.
“We had kids (travel) from all over the place … over 200 kids turned up.
“It doesn’t matter where you come from … we have kids who are Australian, Maori, Samoan and they bring something significant to the group and everyone benefits from those interactions.
“We’re not just a Tongan team, we’re a community.
“That’s the most powerful aspect of it all.”
The club has been training out of Gold Coast Eagles Rugby Union and Southport Tigers Rugby League clubs to accommodate the growing number of athletes.
“It’s a cross-coded program, but the rugby union side has grown 500 per cent and we just want to continue that success.
“We’ve got support everywhere, and it’s great when you can bring people together to form a great environment.”
Many athletes in fact had not been exposed to the union code prior to joining Tonga’s journey to build a community - something Leaatoa pointed to as another huge win.
“What I see as success last year was everyone coming together.
“It was a new sport for 99 per cent of the team, but they all embraced it and more importantly they embraced what we were trying to build as a culture.
“That was the most powerful thing.”
Looking past the approaching Pacific Youth Rugby Festival, the avid President said he hopes to build more than just a sporting club.
“Culture and community is our number one, we just happen to play a bit of sport while we’re at it,” he said.
“We want to be an association that can build pathways.
“Obviously we play sport along the way, but in regards to education and life skills, that’s what we want to promote.
“We know that if we put it all together, we can build better communities and better people so hopefully we can keep driving that and keep growing.”
Note: Under-16s boys and Under-14 girls to be name on eve of tournament
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