CI gains World Cup entry

Cook Islands Rugby League has been given an automatic entry to the 2013 World Cup along with the 10 countries from the 2008 World Cup by the Rugby League International Federation.

There are 14 teams in the next World Cup comprising of the 10 teams from the last World Cup with the Cook Islands and Wales gaining automatic entry and all other countries wishing to be considered will play off in 2011 for the last two positions.

The Cooks automatic entry is due to the squad’s recent strong performances winning the silver medal at the 2009 Pacific Mini Games and most importantly coming runners up at the 2009 Pacific Cup in PNG last year.

It is a dream come true for Cook Islands Rugby League to qualify for the Rugby 2013 League World Cup.

“Our dream has always been to make the World Cup and we were totally gutted in 2006 when we missed out in the qualifying round,” president Charles Carlson said.

“So learning from the experience we re-grouped and set our target for the 2013 World Cup.”

The aim for CIRL was to perform well at every international fixture sanctioned by the RLIF which is crucial in improving the ranking of Cook Islands after it slumped badly during the qualifying rounds of the 2008 World Cup.

It was a tough challenge but after winning silver at the mini-games and beating World Cup qualifier Samoa in the knockout game of the Pacific Cup suddenly the Cook Islands were back in the picture.

Beating World Cup semi-finalist Fiji Bati in the semi-final to meet PNG in the final certainly rocked the league world.

Unfortunately, the Cook Islands were knocked out by a very classy and talented PNG team riddled with NRL players in the finals and missing out on a place in the Four Nations which includes New Zealand, Australia and England.

However, this incredible performance by the Cook Islands was enough to convince the RLIF Board that they deserve to be in the World Cup without going through the qualifying rounds again.

“We knew we had a good shot at the World Cup if we performed well at the mini-games and especially the Pacific Cup so nothing was left to chance,” Carlson said.

“We basically threw all our eggs into one basket and went for broke.”

In fact CIRL was literally broke having reached the overdraft limit which was secured by the president and the vice president but the investment certainly paid off.

CIRL acknowledges the support of CISNOC president Sir Geoffrey Henry and his board members, prime minster Jim Marurai and Aunty Ngamau Munokoa, the minister of sports at the time, for backing them up financially when the odds were against the Cook Islands league squad.

CIRL would also like to acknowledge Tata Crocombe of The Rarotongan Beach Resort and Spa for his on-going support to rugby league and especially to our international team.