[5] Australian soldiers stationed in the country during and after the Second World War reintroduced the sport [6] and in 1949 and the Papua New Guinea Rugby Football League was founded.
A record attendance was established at the Papua New Guinea Grand Final held at the Morobean capital on 8 September 2010.
In October 2015, Papua New Guinea sealed a deal to co-host the 2017 Rugby League World Cup along with Australia and New Zealand.
The competition follows the conventional Australian NRL format, with 26 round robin games followed by the top 4 teams entering the finals play-offs.
Below the Digicel Cup exist many local and provincial competitions, the most prestigious of which is the Port Moresby League.
[11] In 2021, Prime Minister James Marape supported the bid, stating his country wanted an NRL team by 2025.
[12] Many have also suggested the addition of one NRL team for both Papua New Guinea and the city of Cairns in Far North Queensland.
[15] In a nation where communities are far apart and many people live at a minimal subsistence level, rugby league is the lifeblood of the country and is considered a matter of life and death.
During the 2000 Rugby League World Cup an estimated audience of 2 million[citation needed] watched the Kumuls lose to the Welsh Dragons in the quarter-finals in the early hours of the morning local time.
[7] A sold-out crowd always comes to watch the annual match between the Kumuls and the Australian Prime Minister's XIII.