The Pacific solution

Look through a yearbook from one of Sydney's selective academic high schools and the preponderance of students who trace their family line to Asia is an inescapable fact. Have a look at the photographs in the NRL media guide, particularly in the under-20s squads, and the spectacular success of Polynesian players is equally apparent.

For every Israel Folau, Sonny Bill Williams and Willie Mason who sit at rugby league's most-esteemed tables, there's a pool of talented aspirants waiting to replace or usurp them. And, like the players themselves, the pool is getting bigger, fuelled by the spectacular success of the current stars and role models but also by the realisation among families in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific that rugby league can be a lucrative career.

Thirty 15-year-olds, the pick of the next crop of "Polys", were put through their paces for three days in Sydney this week - on and off the field - by those who've already walked in their shoes. Their eyes were agog and their ears open as they listened and talked to former first-graders such as Tyran Smith and John Hopoate and current players such as Sia Soliola of the Sydney Roosters and South Sydney veteran Nigel Vagana.

The Pacific Education Camp was organised by the NSW Rugby League's Pacific Islander development manager, Dave Lakisa, who is as thrilled as anyone about the success of the Islanders but is also trying to keep plans A and B in balance. With every stride forward Folau makes, Plan B slips further behind for a 15-year-old kid with a dream - and nowadays with a dad who thinks his son might be onto something.

Soane Manumua, currently negotiating a development contract with Parramatta, says he's under "heaps" of pressure. "My dad's just telling me get more involved in the game. He knows I'm a good player, he just wants me to get more involved. The more I get involved the more I get noticed," Manumua said. "But my mum, she just doesn't want me to play because she reckons I'll get hurt. My dad knows I've got a future if I work hard at it."

A generation ago, rugby league was a game and sometimes a dream. Kids today are living in a world where it's also a prospective career. "Rugby league's become a job now," says Manumua. It's a job he wants, but that's no automatic guarantee of success. "We're teaching the importance of keeping it balanced, between football and education. There's a lack of Plan Bs," Lakisa said.

Folau's success is inspiring a new generation. "The Pacific and Maori community is very small and they feel when one achieves, we can all achieve. In what's generally a low socio-economic demographic, of course that's leading to more Plan As. You can compare it to the African-American influence in basketball," Lakisa said.

Soliola, with six Kiwi Test caps at only 21, explains the change. "When I was younger, it was always that education was the way, which it still is, but rugby league is a big goal too," he said.

"The parents are definitely encouraging it. They're actually looking at it as the way of the future. I really believe a lot of parents are really turning to this as an opportunity and giving it a lot more respect."

Matt Rua made it to the top, playing five seasons for the Storm. Now he's back as the Melbourne side's multicultural and indigenous development officer. He'd love to see more Polynesian referees, coaches and administrators but insists the doors of opportunity in rugby league are wide open: 80 per cent of the Storm's under-20s are of Pacific Island, Maori or indigenous background.

Rua has a theory about why such success has come. "Our traditional cultural practices help us develop rhythm and balance - like indigenous people. This is my own theory: we're not too many generations away from our traditional practices being a part of everyday life," he said.

Closer perhaps to a warrior past? "I think everybody's got it in them," Rua replied. "The Anglos have the Celts and the Vikings, so it's in them too. Perhaps there's a little bit more of a gap but it's in there, the toughness."

Toughness is one thing, a great physique for rugby league another. But as Lakisa has stressed to the teenagers, application is essential as is taking their chance.

"The key to me isn't cultural identity crisis, it's opportunity," Lakisa said. "Just like any player, when opportunity comes, you've got to take it - regardless of nationality, regardless of socio-economic status."

Surveying his peers as they work through an attacking drill, young Manumua seems to have absorbed the lesson. "Right now, they're looking like they'll make it," he said. "But it depends on what decisions you make. They want it, but sometimes they just slack off. If they just want to come up on game day and play they won't make it."