Roela Radiniyavuni (born 7 April 1990) is a Fijian

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as just rugby league and sometimes football, footy, rugby or league, is a full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular field measuring 68 metres (75 yards) wide and 112 ...

and

rugby union Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School 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 m ...

footballer who played for the

New Zealand Warriors The New Zealand Warriors are a professional rugby league football club based in Auckland, New Zealand that competes in the National Rugby League (NRL) premiership and is the League's only team from outside Australia. They were formed in 1995 as ...

in the

NRL Women's Premiership The Telstra NRL Women's Premiership (NRLW) is Australia's national rugby league competition for women's rugby league in Australia, female players. The first season of the league began in September 2018 with four teams. The league is run by the ...

. Primarily a er, Radiniyavuni has represented

Fiji Fiji ( , ,; fj, Viti, ; Fiji Hindi: फ़िजी, ''Fijī''), officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consists ...

in rugby league, rugby union and rugby sevens.

Biography

Born in

Suva Suva () is the capital and largest city of Fiji. It is the home of the country's largest metropolitan area and serves as its major port. The city is located on the southeast coast of the island of Viti Levu, in Rewa Province, Central Divi ...

, Radiniyavuni represented

and rugby sevens before switching to rugby league in 2019.

Rugby league career

In 2019, Radiniyavuni relocated to

Auckland, New Zealand Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

and began playing rugby league for the

Richmond Roses Richmond most often refers to: * Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States * Richmond, London, a part of London * Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England * Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada * Richmond, California, ...

. On 22 June 2019, she represented

, starting on the and scoring a try in a 28–0 win over Papua New Guinea. In July 2019, she represented the

Akarana Falcons The Auckland rugby league team is the team which traditionally represents all of the clubs which play in the Auckland Rugby League competition. As well as a senior men's team there are also Auckland representative teams throughout the various a ...

at the

NZRL The New Zealand Rugby League (NZRL) is the governing body for the sport of rugby league football in New Zealand. SPARC, 2009: 13 The NZRL was founded on 25 April 1910 in preparation for a tour of Great Britain that same year.Coffey and Wood ''T ...

Women's National Tournament. On 10 July 2019, Radiniyavuni joined the

team. In Round 2 of the

2019 NRL Women's season The 2019 NRL Women's Premiership was the second season of professional women's rugby league in Australia. Teams Pre-season Regular season The season again operated under a round-robin format, with games played as curtain-raisers to the ...

, Radiniyavuni made her debut for the Warriors in a 6–26 loss to the St George Illawarra Dragons.

Rugby union career

In November 2019, Radiniyavuni returned to rugby sevens, rejoining the Fijian national team. She competed at the

2020 Summer Olympics The , officially the and also known as , was an international multi-sport event held from 23 July to 8 August 2021 in Tokyo, Japan, with some preliminary events that began on 21 July. Tokyo was selected as the host city during the ...

. She won a bronze medal at the event. Radiniyavuni was named in the

Fijiana Drua Fijiana Drua are a Fijian rugby union team based in Australia. Rugby Australia announced in February 2022 that they had joined the Super W competition. History The Fijiana Drua would is the first Fijian team to join the Super W competition with ...

squad for the

2022 Super W season The 2022 Super W season was the fifth edition of the Super W competition. The Fijiana Drua joined the five Super W teams for the 2022 season, and won the championship. The New South Wales Waratahs#Women's team, New South Wales Waratahs were the fo ...

. In 2022, Radiniyavuni was named in the

Fijiana The Fiji women's national rugby sevens team represents Fiji at regional and international sevens tournaments. They have won three Pacific Games gold medals, two Oceania Championships, a silver medal at the Commonwealth Games and a bronze medal a ...

squad for two test matches against

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

and

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

. She started in the game against Japan and scored a try in the 29th minute. She also started in the test against Australia. Radiniyavuni was named on the bench in the warm up match against

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

ahead of the World Cup. She was selected for the

squad to the

2021 Rugby World Cup The 2021 Rugby World Cup was the ninth staging of the women's Rugby World Cup, as organised by World Rugby. It was held from 8 October to 12 November 2022 in Auckland and Whangārei, New Zealand. It was originally scheduled to be held in 2021, ...

in New Zealand.

References

External links

*
NRL profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Radiniyavuni, Roela 1990 births Living people Fijian female rugby union players Fijian female rugby league players Fiji women's national rugby league team players Rugby league wingers Rugby union wings New Zealand Warriors (NRLW) players Sportspeople from Suva Olympic rugby sevens players for Fiji Rugby sevens players at the 2020 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 2020 Summer Olympics Olympic bronze medalists for Fiji Olympic medalists in rugby sevens Fiji international women's rugby sevens players Fiji women's international rugby union players