Kia ora, Talofa, Ma’lelei, Bula and Welcome to Season 09 Episode 31 of Breakfast Bites, by TEIVOVOdigital.com – a wrap of Pasifika people’s sports news, on a sunny and bright Tuesday morning 07 May 2024.
 
Coming to you with tons of hanisi from the 180th meridian, in the middle of the blue continent.
                                                                  
In rugby union: So what happened to the Fiji Men’s 7s team at the Singapore 7s?
 
At least they made it into the Top 8 for the SVNS 7s League Grand Finals in Madrid at the end of May. Unlike Samoa who slipped into the promotion-relegation competition in Madrid and risk falling out of the top 7s series altogether.  
 
In rugby league: Tongans on the move! David Fifita’s future on the Gold Coast is up in the air with three Clubs now linked to the Titans superstar offering A$850,000 a year.

Fellow Tongan enforcer, Tevita Pangai Junior is in talks with Craig Bellamy at the Storm as he eyes a return to the NRL.

Meanwhile, Cooper Cronk believes South Sydney should pay Wayne Bennett whatever he wants to leave the Dolphins “Right now.”

 “They’ve suffered heavy losses the last three weeks and this can’t continue for the rest of the season.”

In SportsBiz: There are worrying signs that the global F1 racing series has hit some speed bumps in the United States.

Last year on ESPN the F1 season on US television, generated an average of 1.1 million viewers across ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC, an 8% drop from the 2022 average of 1.2 million.

F1 Racing also suffered a dramatic decline in social media mentions and growth last year, according to the London-based social intelligence group Buzz Radar, who report F1 was down 70% in the first five months of 2023 compared to the same period in 2022, with new followers down 46% and social reach down 64%.

At this early stage of the 2024 season, viewership on ESPN in the US is trending downward again from last year: Averaging only 728,000 viewers.

The season-opening races in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the Australian Grand Prix all suffered lower viewers.

On a positive note, the Japanese and the Chinese Grand Prix races recorded huge spikes.
An explanation for the overall dip in US TV viewership this year, could be that a couple of the early season F1 races were broadcast live overnight in the US, or on Saturdays instead of Sundays, according to ESPN.
Then there’s the Max Verstappen factor.
In Football: Central Coast Mariners have become just the second A-League team to win an Asian Club Competition after beating Lebanese team Al-Ahed 1-0 in the AFC Cup final.
 
An 84th-minute goal in Muscat, Oman yesterday morning secured the Mariners the victory, as well as A$2.3Million in prizemoney.
They also clinched the A-League premiership last week.

Finally, in combat sports: Japan’s Naoya ‘The Monster’ Inoue suffered his first ever knockdown in the opening round against Mexico’s Luiz Nery.

Defending the IBF, WBA, WBC and WBO Super Bantamweight World titles, “The Monster” bounced back with a second-round knockdown of Nery and soon took over with his brutal punches resulting in another knockdown in the fifth, and then the KO in the sixth round at the sold-out, 55,000-seat Tokyo Dome.

Sayonara Nery!

And that’s a wrap!
 
Please hit the like and subscribe buttons below if you want to receive more Pasifika sports highlights on Breakfast Bites.
 
Mahalo and Ka kite; for TEIVOVOdigital.com, I’m Culden Kamea tanking you all too mass for all your love and support.
 
#TEIVOVORugby  #TEIVOVODigital #TeivovoRugby #TeivovoDigital #rugby #rugby7s #FijiRugby #rugbyunion #rugbyleague #Raka #team #rugbytraining #sports #FRU #Fiji #womensrugby #rugbygirls #wrugby #ladiesrugby #womeninsport  #woman #rugby #rugby7s #FijiRugby #rugbyunion #rugbyleague #fitness #weightlifting #training #team #rugbytraining #sports  #rakavi  #DevelopmentFiji