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Almost a year after falling short of meeting them in a World Cup final, Tonga finally get a crack at Australia in a historic rugby league Test.

All year they've been calling out the world champions.

Now Tonga get the chance to show why when they meet the Kangaroos for the first time in Test history at a sold out Mt Smart Stadium on Saturday.

Almost a year ago, the Mate Ma'a captured the imagination of the rugby league public by coming within two points of a fairytale World Cup final against Australia.

It came off the back of the famous defections of Andrew Fifita and Jason Taumalolo from the Kangaroos and New Zealand respectively.

Fifita this year led calls for the red nation to face the green and gold.

Fifita again stole headlines in the build-up this week when he hit out his NRL club, Cronulla, for failing to recognise his achievements with Tonga at an awards night.

So widespread has the interest been in an Australia-Tonga Test that Kangaroos players took a major pay cut for the match to be staged.

It has even stole the limelight from the Kangaroos Test against New Zealand last week, where a crowd of less than 13,000 filled the venue.

"It's been totally dominated media-wise by them, which is fantastic, playing it over here, big crowd, that's what we want to do," Kangaroos coach Meninga said.

Australia's status as the premier rugby league nation took a hit last week when they suffered shock two-point loss to World Cup disappointments New Zealand.

Meninga admitted the defeat had opened the door for critics to claim the Kangaroos are now vulnerable without the retired Cameron Smith and Billy Slater.

On paper, he could be right.

Nine of the Australian players who beat England in the World Cup final are gone, while Tonga have 16 of the 17 who lost to the Pommies remain.

Tonga coach Kristian Wool is banking on the continuity ahead of arguably the biggest Test in their nation's history.

"We've had some really big occasions in that 12 months," Woolf said.

"You go to the Samoa game at the World Cup, the emotion around that was a massive occasion that I didn't think could be topped.

"And then it got topped the next week against New Zealand, and that got topped again against England.

"The Samoa game this year was a big occasion with plenty of emotion and plenty of expectation on our blokes as well.

"What they've done in that time together, they've come together as a group and learnt how to deal with that emotion, how to handle those occasions."

Kangaroos captain Boyd Cordner said he and his teammates are looking forward to the contest just as much as their counterparts.

"Off the back of a strong World Cup they had, they've made some noise and rightfully so," Cordner said.

"They had some big defeats and also in that semi-final there nearly knocked off England in the dying stages.

"They're a great team and their country has got behind them.

"It's really good for the international game. They wanted this game and so did we, we wanted it just as bad. So we can't wait for tomorrow night."