FOURTEEN-year-old Mahlia Rivers-Ruri is one of many touch football talents to watch out in the future for Papua New Guinea.

Currently based in Australia, she had the opportunity to don the red, black and gold colors at the 2024 Touch World Cup in Nottingham England.

The youngest member in the PNG Open Women’s team said it was surreal for her getting to play with some of the veterans who she has heard stories about, despite PNG’s disqualification following late arrival at the international event.

“I’ve only heard stories about most of these veteran players who have featured for PNG at the Pacific Games winning gold medals in 2015 and 2019 as well as the World Cup appearances.”

“To make it to a world cup which was my first and play alongside, the feeling is surreal playing next to elites who have worn the tricolors at big events.”

Mahlia qualified to represent PNG through her mum Australian-Papua New Guinean mum who is part East New Britain and while her dad is of Maori lineage, New Zealand.

“I started playing when I was eight years old as a junior and I still am competing in the competitions in Australia.”

“Had the privilege to represent PNG at the 2023 Asia-Pacific Youth Touch (APYT) tournament that was hosted in Australia, I guess that helped me gain a lot of exposure playing against kids my age or older at this event.”

She said seeing her parents and younger sister fly all the way to United Kingdom to watch her play her first test match in Nottingham was a very supportive move and she hopes to wear those colors once more in the future.

“It’s been a great exposure getting to play at this level, been the youngest of the team, I have learnt to adapt and observe what the senior players did and tried maintaining that among other fresh faces in the team.”

“My ultimate goal is to don that PNG colors again in the future, I hope this experience counts and takes me further as I still have a long way to go with the touch footy career,” she added.