John Kear Says Extra Gear Has Been Packed For Wales’ World Cup Opener In PNG

After four decades in rugby league there is little left for John Kear to experience, but the Wales manager will tick another box on Saturday.

A former national coach of France and England, Kear will get his first taste of the passion that envelops the locals of Papua New Guinea when he takes his team to Port Moresby for their opening World Cup game.

PNG is the only country in the world where rugby league is the national sport and the national stadium is expected to be packed to the rafters when the Kumuls host the first of three group games in the capital.

“It’s a new experience for me and it’s one of the reasons I was so excited when we got put in the same group as PNG,” said Kear, who says he is preparing his players for the cauldron they can expect.

“We’ve shown them tweets from the Aussie players when they went over to PNG in September, when the locals were banging on the bus and chasing them everywhere.

“We’ve tried to explain that it is unique, that there isn’t a country where rugby league is so much the national sport. So we’ve tried to prime them as best we can but it will be a new experience.”

The locals have become so excited in the past that police have used teargas to break up the crowds and Kear fully expects some of his players to lose their kit in the traditional post-match pitch invasion.

“We’ve made contingency plans in the event of, shall we say, we are asked to donate our kit to the locals,” he said. “We’re taking another set so, should that happen, we’re still alright to play the next game.”

It is 17 years since Wales last won a World Cup game but Kear, who attended Sunday’s launch in Brisbane with captain Craig Kopczak, revels in the role of underdog, having guided Sheffield Eagles and Hull to unexpected Challenge Cup final success, and he is confident Wales will be competitive.

“It’s not the wealthiest organisation,” he said. “They can’t provide all the resources that Australia and England get but that backs-against-the-wall spirit appeals to me. We make the best of what we’ve got.

“Wales haven’t won a World Cup game since 2000. That’s one I was involved in and hopefully they can win one in the next one I’m involved with.

“The first aim is ticking off a win so that we break that duck and then, if we get the win early on, I don’t think there’s any reason to think we can’t go through the group stages and play in the knockout stages. That would be a massive success for everybody involved in Wales.”

Having initially camped in Brisbane, Wales headed out to Port Moresby on Tuesday to prepare for their first game, before flying to Townsville to take on Fiji on November 5 and meeting Ireland in their final group game in Perth a week later.

“I feel we’ve got the toughest inter-group game because there’s 18 out of 24 NRL players in that Fiji team but we’ll play the cards we’re dealt,” said Kear.

Wales squad: Elliot Kear, Rhys Williams, Michael Channing, Andrew Gay, Regan Grace, Courtney Davies, Matt Seamark, Craig Kopczak (c), Steve Parry, Philip Joseph, Rhodri Lloyd, Ben Morris, Morgan Knowles, Matty Fozard, Sam Hopkins, Ben Evans, Chester Butler, Josh Ralph, Dalton Grant, Christiaan Roets, Matthew Barron.