AAP: RUGBY league officials must decide where to play the 2025 Tonga v Samoa match, with Samoa coach Ben Gardiner believing it could attract more than 50,000 fans.
Rugby league officials must decide whether to host next year’s Tonga-Samoa blockbuster at Accor Stadium, in a bid to push for the biggest Test crowd in Australia in 50 years.
Sunday’s Pacific Championships finals at nearby CommBank Stadium drew a sold-out crowd of 28,728, with Australia’s 20-14 win coming in front of a passionate pro-Tonga crowd.
The results mean Tonga, New Zealand and Samoa will play in next year’s Pacific Cup, while Australia are expected to embark on an Ashes tour of the UK.
AAP has been told that New Zealand will host both their matches against the Pacific heavyweights, while Tonga and Samoa are likely to face off at CommBank Stadium.
But there is an argument that officials should aim bigger.
The NRL had held concerns over ticket sales for Sunday’s final before Tonga qualified to face Australia, such is the pulling power of their team.
Samoa are equally popular, with a heavy population base also around western Sydney.
The two sides have not faced off in Australia since 2018, but in that time Samoa have reached a World Cup final and now boast some of the best players in the NRL.
There is a legitimate belief that together the two sides could draw in a crowd of more than 50,000, when combining both fan bases and neutral followers.
“We would like to play it in Samoa and take a game back to the people there,” Samoa coach Ben Gardiner told AAP.
“But if it wasn’t there I would like to give it the best possible chance to give it the biggest possible crowd.
“In a perfect world, 50,000 would definitely be do-able I think.
“It’s something that would stick in people’s memories, with the kind of crowd that would turn out and the noise and atmosphere it would create.”
Only one Test match has drawn in a crowd of more than 50,000 in Australia since the end of 1970, with 50,509 fans attending the 2008 World Cup final in Brisbane.
If the Tonga-Samoa match was to be hosted at Accor Stadium, it would need to be early in the Pacific Championships before Oasis plays there on November 7.
There are other options, with strong expat communities of both Pacific nations residing in Auckland.
That push is backed by Tonga captain Jason Taumalolo, after the scenes at Mt Smart Stadium following his country’s win over the Kiwis.
Suncorp Stadium could hold 52,000, with a heavy Polynesian presence in Brisbane and 33,196 turning out for the Kangaroos-Tonga match there last month.
Tonga coach Kristian Woolf is keen to take the match home to Nuku’alofa, but if that is not possible he believes it should stay at Parramatta in western-Sydney heartland.
“The one thing I love about (what we’ve done), coming to where Tongan people live,” Woolf said.
“We’re not trying to do something and asking people to come to us.
“That’s what I like about CommBank or when we played at Penrith or in western Sydney. That’s where our people live.”
