Rising Kiwi rugby league star Fine Kula forced to quit NRL after brain cancer diagnosis

Rising Kiwi NRL star Fine Kula, 21, has been forced to quit rugby league after being diagnosed with brain cancer. Photo / Twitter.

Rising Kiwi NRL star Fine Kula, 21, has been forced to quit rugby league after discovering that his painful headaches were actually brain cancer.

Kula announced that he would be retiring due to his life-threatening condition in an Instagram post on Saturday.

"Been deleting this and redoing it but really don't know how to say it. But I started playing the game of rugby league at 12 years old and I have loved the game ever since," the front-rower wrote.

"It gave me the opportunity to uplift my family to Australia, been such a pleasure playing for the Sharks, made friends that I know will be friends for a long time, but due to medical reasons for now gonna have to hang up the boots.

"Hurts thinking about it, footy has been a lifestyle for me past seven years. But being around family and getting healthy is next task for me. Thanks everyone who has messaged me.'

Kula began the summer as one of rugby league's most promising props.

The 21 year old was training with the Cronulla Sharks top squad with a view to earning a top-30 contract and fulfilling his ambition of playing in the NRL.

Congrats @Cronulla_Sharks Fine Kula winning the Harold Matthews Player of the Year at the @NSWRL Brad Fittler Medal!! pic.twitter.com/aVDTJsmmwT

— John Morris (@jmorris_09) September 14, 2015

However, Fine's world came crashing down when he learned that headaches he had been experiencing since Christmas were the result of brain cancer.

''It's not like I haven't had headaches before, [but] they don't normally last that long, usually just a day, and then I feel better,'' Kula told the Sydney Morning Herald.

''The first day it happened, I thought it was normal. I just took some Nurofen. I thought it would go away. But then the next day it happened again, and then the next day and the next day.

''I started to get a bit concerned because it was happening every day. And it wasn't just happening once a day, it was happening every hour or every 10 minutes. At that point, and it's just me, I didn't think it was that serious.''

Turns out it is very serious. After a battery of tests, the medicos delivered their diagnosis on Thursday: brain cancer.

Given this type of cancer is rarely found in adults, the survival rates are largely unknown.

''I was speechless,'' Kula told the Sydney Morning Herald. ''I didn't have any emotions until afterwards. I'm still kind of processing it now. I'm a positive kind of person. I wouldn't even think too much of it. I will just have to keep working hard to get better.''

The news has rocked the Kula family, who moved to Australia from New Zealand to support Fine's NRL dream.

On Monday, Kula will undergo surgery to insert a VP shunt that will reduce the pressure in his skull and drain excess fluid from the ventricles. Then he can return home, where he will prepare for bouts of radiation and chemotherapy once he has recovered.

Just weeks after his 21st birthday, Kula acknowledged that his dream of playing in the NRL is over.

It is an ambition he was on track to fulfil just a month ago.

Kula moved from New Zealand to Australia six years ago and joined the Sharks when he was just 15 years old.

This was a youngster going places, a former Junior Kiwis star who had already received Harold Matthews player of the year honours at club and state level. As late as last month, he was training alongside Cronulla's NRL squad with a view to earning a top-30 contract.

A GoFundme page has been created to support Kula through this difficult period.