The Australian government is expected to announce, today, that it will drop $600 million to help create a rugby league team for Papua New Guinea.

Has Prime Minister Anthony Albanese let his love of rugby league go to his head? Announcing this sort of spend during a cost of living crisis? Or is this an uncanny political move?

Today, foreign affairs and national security correspondent Matthew Knott, on the soft diplomacy that will land with the hard thud of a crash tackle. And how effective it might be at combatting the influence of China in the Pacific.