Atawhai Tupaea

Atawhai Tupaea (born 3 February 1989) is a New Zealand rugby league footballer who played as a centre for the New Zealand Warriors in the NRL Women's Premiership.

Atawhai Tupaea

Personal information
Full name	Atawhai Message
Born	(1989-02-03) 3 February 1989 (age 36) Papakura, Auckland, New Zealand
Height	166 cm (5 ft 5 in)
Weight	77 kg (12 st 2 lb)
Playing information
Position	Centre, Wing, Fullback
Representative Years Team Pld T G FG P 2014–19 New Zealand 10 6 0 0 24 2017 - 2019 New Zealand 9s 4 1 0 0 4
Source: RLP As of 28 November 2020

She is a New Zealand representative.

Background

Born in Papakura, Auckland, Tupaea represented New Zealand in tag, rugby, touch football before switching to rugby league.^[1]

Playing career

In 2014, Tupaea began playing for the Papakura Sisters and represented Counties Manukau.^[2] On 9 November 2014, she made her Test debut for New Zealand, scoring a try in their 12–8 win over Australia at WIN Stadium.^[3] On 28 January 2015, she was named the NZRL Women's Player of the Year.^[4]

On 6 May 2016, she started on the wing and scored two tries for New Zealand in their 26–16 win over Australia.^[5]

In 2017, she played all five games for New Zealand at the 2017 Women's Rugby League World Cup, including starting on the wing in their 16–23 final loss to Australia.^[6]

In 2019, Tupaea returned to rugby league after a year off and was signed by the New Zealand Warriors NRL Women's Premiership team.^[7] In Round 1 of the 2019 NRL Women's season, she made her debut for the Warriors, starting at centre and scoring a try in their 16–12 win over the Sydney Roosters.^[8]

In October 2019, she joined New Zealand's 2019 Rugby League World Cup 9s-winning squad.^[9]

Atawhai is a proud mum of two and wife