 | ||
| Union | Tonga Rugby Football Union | |
|---|---|---|
| Nickname(s) | ʻIkale Tahi | |
| Emblem(s) | The White Dove | |
| Ground(s) | Lawaqa Park, Sigatoka | |
| ||
Tonga A is a national representative rugby union team of the Tongan rugby union. It is the second-tier side to the Tonga national rugby union team. Tonga A competes in the Pacific Challenge, formerly known as the Pacific Rugby Cup, against teams including Samoa A and Fiji Warriors. [1] [2] Since 2017, the team has also competed in the Americas Pacific Challenge.
Rugby union, commonly known in most of the world simply as rugby, is a contact team sport which originated in England in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its most common form, a game is between two teams of 15 players using an oval-shaped ball on a rectangular field with H-shaped goalposts at each end.
Rugby union is the national sport of Tonga. Tonga are considered to be a tier 2 rugby nation by the International Rugby Board.
The Tonga national rugby union team is nicknamed ʻIkale Tahi . Like their Polynesian neighbours, the Tongans start their matches with a war dance – the Sipi Tau. They are members of the Pacific Islands Rugby Alliance (PIRA) along with Fiji and Samoa. The Ikale Tahi achieved a historic 19–14 victory over France in the 2011 Rugby World Cup, but having lost to New Zealand and Canada, were unable to achieve what would have been their first ever presence at the quarter-finals.
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Between 2006 and 2010, Tonga was represented by two teams at the Pacific Rugby Cup; Tau'uta Reds and Tautahi Gold.
Tau'uta Reds is a former Tongan rugby union team that played in the Pacific Rugby Cup from 2006 to 2010. The other Tongan team in the Cup was Tautahi Gold.
Tautahi Gold is a former Tongan rugby union team that played in the Pacific Rugby Cup from 2006 to 2010. The other Tongan team in the Cup was Tau'uta Reds. The team's name is from the Tautahi, which was Tonga's traditional Navy Army. Gold was chosen as the team's colour from the Sun which Tongans use as their navigational campus.
In 2010, Tonga A played three matches against other national A teams as an invited side to the Americas Rugby Championship. Earlier in that year Tonga A also played two matches against Fiji Warriors in the first Punjas Series. The Tongans had one win and one loss but lost the series on aggregate scores. [3] This result was repeated in the second (and concluding) Punjas Series in 2011. [4]
The Americas Rugby Championship, often informally called the Americas' Six Nations, is an annual international rugby tournament between six North and South American nations: Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, the United States and Uruguay. The current international tournament is the second format of the competition to bear the name.
The Fiji Warriors, also referred to as Fiji A, is a national representative rugby team of rugby union in Fiji. It is the second-tier side to the Fiji national team. The Warriors team is selected from players in the Fijian domestic competitions and competes in the World Rugby Pacific Challenge against Samoa A and Tonga A. Since 2016, the Fiji Warriors team has played in the Americas Pacific Challenge against national A teams from North and South America.
The Punjas Rugby Series was a rugby union challenge series played between Fiji A and Tonga A. It was sponsored by Fijian company Punja & Sons and played in Fiji in 2010 and 2011. There was some discussion about expanding the series to include teams from Samoa, the Cook Islands and PNG, but this did not eventuate and the series ended after the 2011 edition.
The Pacific Rugby Cup was reorganised in 2011, and has since been mainly contested by national 'A' teams. The Tonga A side became the sole Tongan representative in the PRC from then on.
