The side has been put together by Oceania Footballer of the Year Wynton Rufer after the one-time Swiss top-flight player received an invitation to send a team for the 75th anniversary of the tournament which gathers youth talent from around Switzerland, and further afield, for the annual event.
His inclusion in the team came as a surprise to the young midfielder who began playing as a six-year-old in Brisbane before returning to his native Papua New Guinea where he continued to develop his skills.
“I guess my name had been floating around Auckland a bit so I think through that, and based on merit, I got involved,” Komolong says.
Rufer says he came across the Papua New Guinea international through his connections with the Oceania Football Confederation after he made enquiries about the talent outside of New Zealand.
“I haven’t seen Alwin play but I have heard very good reports from the current players in my squad who have played with or against him when he’s been in Auckland,” Rufer says.
The two-day tournament, which is being held from 8-9 May in Zurich, will not be Komolong’s first taste of European football.
After stints learning the trade in Australia and Papua New Guinea, Komolong headed to Germany as a 14-year-old to visit family, and ended up playing for a local club for a year-and-a-half. From there he returned to Papua New Guinea playing for the local development squad for two years before he travelled to New Zealand for the OFC U-17 Championship in 2011.
“I got a scholarship to stay in Auckland and play for Liston College. That’s where I finished my high school education, so two years there, and then following that I returned to Papua New Guinea,” he says.
“Now I’ve been back a year and am attending university part-time studying Science Foundation.”
While he’s looking forward to participating in the tournament’s historic anniversary, Komolong also has one eye on his future having secured an offer to attend the University of Oklohoma in the United States of America on a sports scholarship.
“I don’t know a lot about the university, I know that they are playing in the NIRSA – the National Intramural-Recreational Sports Association – where they are the third best team in the country for their division. They’re quite high up so that’s good,” Komolong says.
“As for Oklohoma in general, I’ve been told just to be careful of tornadoes.”
Development in the USA university system most often leads to the possibility of being drafted into Major League Soccer which is a prospect Komolong says he would be happy to consider.
“I’ll be keeping my options open and will see how everything goes. I don’t have a preference really I just want to play. I definitely see myself having a career in football if things pan out, but if not I will have a college degree to fall back on.”

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