Tiana Penitani

Tiana Penitani (born 12 January 1996) is an Australian rugby league footballer who plays for the Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks in the NRL Women's Premiership and the Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks in the NSWRL Women's Premiership.

Tiana Penitani
Personal information
Full nameTiana Penitani
Born (1996-01-12) 12 January 1996
Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
Height169 cm (5 ft 7 in)
Weight70 kg (11 st 0 lb)
Playing information
PositionWinger Centre
Club
Years Team Pld T G FG P
2019–2020 St George Illawarra 6 3 0 0 12
2021– Parramatta Eels 10 4 0 0 16
Total 16 7 0 0 28
Representative
Years Team Pld T G FG P
2019– New South Wales 4 1 0 0 4
2019 Australia 9s 4 5 0 0 20
2019 Australia 1 0 0 0 0
Source: [1]
As of 24 October 2020
Medals
Women's rugby sevens
Representing  Australia
Youth Olympic Games
Gold medal – first place2014 NanjingTeam competition

Primarily a centre, she is an Australia and New South Wales representative. She previously represented Australia in rugby sevens.

Background

Born in Canberra, Penitani played junior rugby league for La Perouse United before switching to rugby union and Oztag.[2] She is of Tongan descent.[2]

Playing career

Rugby union

In 2014, Penitani, along with Brooke Anderson, captained Australia to the Gold medal at the 2014 Summer Youth Olympics, held in China. This was the first time Rugby Sevens had been part of the Olympic programme since 1924. The tournament was Penitani's first in 14 months, following a serious knee injury sustained at the 2013 Rugby World Cup Sevens. At 17 years and 163 days old, she became Australia's youngest ever representative in either 15s or 7s at a World Cup, when she represented Australia in Russia.[3][4][5]

In 2019, Penitani was on the award voting panels for both the World Rugby Men's Sevens Player of the Year and the World Rugby Women's Sevens Player of the Year.[6]

Rugby league

In 2019, Penitani returned to rugby league, joining the Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks NSWRL Women's Premiership team.[7] In May 2019, she represented NSW City at the Women's National Championships.[8]

On 14 June 2019, she signed with the St George Illawarra Dragons NRL Women's Premiership team.[9]

On 21 June 2019, she made her debut for New South Wales, starting at centre in a 14–4 win over Queensland.[10]

In Round 1 of the 2019 NRL Women's season, Penitani made her debut for the Dragons in a 4–14 loss to the Brisbane Broncos.[11] On 6 October 2019, she started at centre in the Dragons' 6–30 Grand Final loss to the Broncos.[12]

In October 2019, she represented Australia at the 2019 Rugby League World Cup 9s, scoring five tries and finishing as the tournament's top try scorer.[13] On 25 October 2019, she made her Test debut for Australia in a 28–8 win over New Zealand.[14]

Tiana was signed with the NRWL Cronulla Sharks inaugural team for 2023 and is the captain of the side

References
  1. "Tiana Penitani - Career Stats & Summary". Rugby League Project. Retrieved 10 November 2020.
  2. Penitani, Tiani (21 June 2019). "I know he's with me every day". Athlete's Voice. Archived from the original on 9 August 2021. Retrieved 10 November 2020.
  3. Pandaram, Jamie (22 March 2013). "Tiana Penitani, 17, will be the youngest person to represent a senior Australian rugby team". PerthNow. Archived from the original on 9 August 2021. Retrieved 9 August 2021.
  4. "Player Profile". Rugby Australia. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 17 December 2015.
  5. Chen, Torin (28 May 2014). "Tiana Penitani and Raecene McGregor selected in Australian Youth Olympic rugby 7s teams". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on 9 August 2021. Retrieved 9 August 2021.
  6. "World Rugby Awards Voting Panel". World Rugby. 5 September 2019. Archived from the original on 9 August 2021. Retrieved 20 September 2019.
  7. "Three Sharks in NSW Women's Blues". Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks. 8 June 2019. Archived from the original on 3 December 2020.
  8. Newton, Alicia (22 May 2019). "Line-ups named for Women's National Championships". National Rugby League. Archived from the original on 8 November 2020.
  9. "Dragons announce first 2019 Women's Premiership signings". St. George Illawarra Dragons. 14 June 2019. Archived from the original on 22 March 2021.
  10. "Harvey Norman NSW Women's Origin team announced". New South Wales Rugby League. 8 June 2019. Archived from the original on 22 October 2020. Retrieved 10 November 2020.
  11. "NRLW late mail: Round 1 v Broncos". St. George Illawarra Dragons. 15 September 2019. Archived from the original on 13 November 2020. Retrieved 10 November 2020.
  12. "NRLW team announcement: Grand final v Broncos". St. George Illawarra Dragons. 1 October 2019. Archived from the original on 25 October 2020. Retrieved 10 November 2020.
  13. "Dragons dozen named for Australia". St. George Illawarra Dragons. 7 October 2019. Archived from the original on 18 October 2020. Retrieved 10 November 2020.
  14. Jillaroos call up a shock for Penitani. National Rugby League. 21 October 2019.
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