The Port Moresby Australian Football League (AFL) Association, is for the first time looking at putting in a total of eight teams to participate in the National Championship coming up in November in the city of Port Moresby.
The Association President, Mr. Douglas Lai, said the AFL National Championship is a big deal for the sporting code and having not participated in one for the past two years since the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, the association is going to go big for both its male and female teams.
“We will be bringing in two sides (male and female) for each team that we’ll be putting in the national championship,” said the president.
Mr. Lai said the teams will represent Port Moresby based clubs and the Central province-based clubs. For the Central province, their competition is still in the early stages, hence the Port Moresby Association will just include them with the city teams to participate.
There will be four teams consisting of the traditional teams of Laurabada and Mirigini, and the new ones AFL Port Moresby Central and AFL Port Moresby NGI. These men’s teams will have the female teams put alongside them and therefore, eight teams in total to participate.
Meanwhile, the National Championship is the platform for which the selections will be made for the national teams to participate in the international events coming up in 2024, which includes the AFL International Cup in Australia.