Nayacalevu, Radradra and Botia reveal senior players and coach had to fork out money from their own pockets in 2023 RWC

Former Fiji Water Flying Fijians skipper Waisea Nayacalevu along with former reps Lepani Botia and Semi Radradra have revealed that former coach Simon Raiwalui and other senior players in the squad to the 2023 Rugby World Cup had to fork out money from their own pockets to share with the local players after their game against Georgia.

During a live interview with a Lesi Vanuavou, Nayacalevu, Botia and Radradra highlighted that they had to use their own money as their pay was delayed.

The players say they had to buy the meals for the local players as well.

Nayacalevu says this has been an ongoing issue for years where the FRU promises players to pay them a certain amount of money or bonuses after tournaments but they fail to see their promises through.

He says this should not be happening at the international level.

Semi Radradra has also revealed that most of the players that went for the 2019 Rugby World Cup in Tokyo have not been fully paid to date.

Radradra says they were promised that they will be paid half of the salary before they left for Tokyo and will receive the remainder of their salary when they come back from Tokyo.

He says this is why they fought hard for the pay to be fully paid to the players before the 2023 RWC quarter final match against England to prevent the same incident that happened in 2019.

We are awaiting a response from Interim Chair of the Fiji Rugby Union, Peter Mazey.