This golden age ended abruptly in 1981 after a failed restructuring of football operations by Australian interests, poor junior performance in the Teal Cup and the withdrawal of funding causing a total collapse of the sport.

The PNG Muruks, the country's only AFL Asia affiliated club, has won the Asian Australian Football Championships in its respective divisions every year since 2018.

There was awareness of the sport early in the 20th Century, with mentions of it in the media dating back to the 1920s, including reports on the QAFL, NSWAFL, NTFL and VFL from the 1940s however it was not played locally.

The league consisted of teams including Konedobu, Wirraways, Razorback, Strafers, Wallabies, Pioneers, Bower Birds, Ack-Redians, John's Gully.

[11] In the Territory of New Guinea, one of the earliest recorded matches was held in the capital Lae and the inland town of Nagada in 1944 by Australian school teachers and defence force personnel.

The 1964 winner was local grown player Herea Amini, of Sogeri College, who was rewarded with a flight to Melbourne to play for 2 weeks with the VFL's Demons.

In 1969 Papua New Guinea sent its first touring side to compete against the Mount Isa league in Queensland for a "North of Australia Championship", played three games and won two of them.

[22] In 1969 on 8 October a touring St Kilda football team from the Victorian Football League (VFL) coached by Allan Jeans[23] visited Port Moresby defeated a composite national PNG team at the South Pacific Oval 9-17-61 to 1-6-12[24] It was the first time the new Hubert Murray Stadium was used for Australian Rules, and was played under lights in front of a large crowd.

[31] By 1973, Bougainville had an 8 team league up and running including Essential Services, Concentrator, Mining, Clerks, CFC, Apprentices, PDF, Hitech.

[33] Sogeri Secondary's team travelled to Melbourne and handed its most prestigious football school, Scotch College, a massive defeat.

In 1973 outstanding Koboni players Vili Maha and Gimana Guma were flown to Australia to be trialled with the club, playing reserves games[35] however they did not break into the senior side.

[45] 1977 saw the first-ever international matches involving Australia at under 17 level between the Victoria Under 17 team (the reigning Australian Champions) and Papua New Guinea.

In 1978 the return touring team led by captain-coach Joel Matage lost 15-11-101 narrowly to the Gold Coast home side 17-13-115 in front of a crowd of 5,000 spectators at Salk Oval.

[51] Kevin Sheehan, newly appointed VFL promotional officer, visited Madang; Goroka, Lae, Rabaul, Kieta, Arawa and Port Moresby on November 9.

[55] Evans began a major and rapid restructure of football operations which largely ignored senior club and representative competition in favour of junior development.

The NFL's Victorian chief John Warren visited in 1980[66] promising a A$100,000 injection of funds and sponsorship from Rothmans International and admission to the council though along with high expectations of the underresourced local competition for coaches, umpires and ground upgrades.

With the withdrawal of the NFL and VFL from Papua New Guinea, the governing body dropped all reference to Australia in its name and reverted to the PNG Rules Football Council.

[70] Unlike the NFL, the VFL was occupied with the expansion its Victorian competition interstate, beginning with the relocation of the South Melbourne Football Club to Sydney.

[72] Under overwhelming financial pressure, the PNG Rules Council was forced to cancel the National Championships for the first time leaving a gaping hole in the competition.

With the introduction of the Kumuls to the Rugby League World Cup in 1985 and international matches were being regularly played in Port Moresby, Rules fell out of favour.

The plan was to include a summary of the current state of Rules Football in PNG, a management structure, facilities improvement, development proposals and financial estimates.

PNG players named in the 1997 World Team were Gibson Isaiah, George Kaore, David Lucas and Willie Lipou.

PNG born Mal Michael participated in the first of three premierships with the Brisbane Lions in 2001, boosting the popularity of football enormously in the country.

In October 2006, the national junior Women's Footy (U16) team, the "Karakums" became the first ever female contact sport side to represent PNG.

[83] Several PNG players were selected to represent the Country Kookaburras U16s squad which lost the Grand Final to the Northern Raiders.

[87] Several players to learn the game in PNG began reaching senior level in Australia in various regional and state leagues in 2007.

Donald Barry, Elijah Baruai[88] and Bergmann Talingapua[89] were all recruited from PNG in 2007 to play for the Manunda Hawks in the AFL Cairns competition.

The expanding program has also seen several PNG players introduced the Sunshine Coast league[90] including Emmanuel Tupia, John Vogae, Gary Kiele and Peter Labi in 2009.

[94] He was followed shortly after by the Gold Coast's signing of talented junior Stanis Susuve and 17-year-old Peter Labi joined the Carlton Football Club on an international scholarship.

[145] However, there are major inhibitors for recruitment, mainly height, with many of the more talented players being under 176 cm which is typically considered too short for professional AFL, strict visa entry rules that limit the amount of time that PNG nationals can develop in Australia, as well as language and cultural barriers.