Toulouse change their recruitment policy

http://www.planetrugby.com/story/0,25883,3551_8740227,00.html

Toulouse coach Guy Novès has admitted the outgoing French champions are in the market for "world class foreigners" to boost their squad.

For the first time in three years Toulouse will not feature in the Top 14 Final and Novès has conceded that if the club are to compete with the likes of Toulon, they will have to change their recruitment policy and reduce the number of French players in his squad.

Les Toulousains have been relatively quiet on the transfer scene so far with just three signatures (Joe Tekori, Jean-Pascal Barraque and Yacouba Camara) but that is set to change. Top of the list for the four-time European champions will be a hooker, a scrum-half and wing.

Forwards coach Williams Servat was forced to make a comeback this season to fill in for injured players and with Gary Botha on the departure list, Toulouse are scouring the market for a replacement.

Springboks Bismarck du Plessis and Chiliboy Ralepelle have already turned down offers in favour of staying in South Africa but with "no Frenchman available" Toulouse are set to widen their search.

With Luke Burgess returning to Australia, Castres scrum-half Rory Kockott has been approached as a possible replacement. But the South African is still under contract with the Top 14 finalists are negotiations around a transfer fee have been inconclusive. Bulls number nine Jano Vermaak has also been made an offer, but is waiting to see if he makes the Springbok side, which would keep him at home.

Toulouse are also seeking a 'medical joker' to fill the gap left by the absence of Vincent Clerc, who is recovering from serious knee surgery.

Novès has reluctantly admitted that due to the overlapping Test and Top 14 calendars, it is no longer viable to have a large contingent of French internationals.

"Our policy will need to evolve," said the Toulouse manager.
"We are proud of our French internationals but we can't have as many (as before) and get results. The two teams that contribute the most internationals to French rugby were eliminated in the semi-finals. You find the error.
"The policies of other clubs have forced us to review our own: Toulon, Montpellier, Racing and Stade Français are recruiting world-class foreigners. We've got French internationals who we demand to perform all year round but that are faced by players who only play for their clubs and are thus fresher. It's unequal.

"We'll have to stop recruiting French internationals and go get top class foreigners.

"A guy like Chris Masoe wanted to come to Toulouse but we said no because we had Gilian Galan and preferred to work with a young Frenchman.

"But the problem is that youngsters need time to evolve, and we've run out of time."



Well this was on the cards after recent success of Toulon & Clermont. Ironically Cotter has told the press yesterday that Clermonts recruitment policy needs looking at for the good of the clubs long term future. One thing is clear though - this is bad news for the French National side as Toulouse have been one of the main contributors to the French national side. I've said all along while French club rugby may be thriving right now it could handicap the French national sides for years to come. I predicted that France would struggle in future years and I can see this continue. Its going to turn the same as English Footie. All the best players in their domestic team but a useless national side. Granted club owners wont care much about this but it could see their national side collapse on itself. Maybe this seasons last place in the 6 nations wont be the last time. Whats your view?

"A guy like Chris Masoe wanted to come to Toulouse but we said no because we had Gilian Galan and preferred to work with a young Frenchman.

"But the problem is that youngsters need time to evolve, and we've run out of time."

Sad state of affairs...and French rugby could seriously suffer. The French Rugby Association need to be monitoring the whole direction of where all their teams are heading at the moment....

From a personal perspective England were bringing loads of foreign journeymen across, taking the place of promising local kids, but in recent years a change of direction and patience by the clubs as they blooded them has lead to the academies churning out talent, like Launchbury, Wade, May, Yarde, Slater, etc and the knock on effect is that it will benefit England.

More bad news for the French national side. Its a race to the bottom which is typical of todays world. Just look at the French clubs to get a good example of how the world economy works.

Its very sad to read this.

Toulouse have always made efforts to produce French players. Looking at their squad now they have got 19 French internationals in their team.

To put that in perspective thats around the same number of Irish internationals that Leinster or Munster have.

A real shame that it has come to this but you can't fault the logic. The squad gets spread so thin without them and they can no longer compete with the likes of Clermont and Toulon.

Such a shame, Toulouse are a great club and were always the flag bearers for bringing in young french players and turning them in to top class players. I don't think they will go to the extent that Toulon have because Toulouse are sensible, they'll recruit a few key players but won't overload like the neighbours down the way.

Sadly, the way the french league is going, this was always going to be the result.

Of course to not be quite so negative, the specific players mentioned would mean replacing foreign players with foreign players, eg Burgess who was himself a replacement for Byron Kelleher. So maybe the makeup of the squad wont change that much, maybe it means there has been a power shift in French rugby and Toulouse can't just automatically attract the best French players?

To be honest I don't think Toulouse are wanting to change thier policy long term, but by making a public statment like this, and then reciuting some NFQ players they are making the FFR sit up and take notice.

There is a limit on NFQ players and its due to decrease but the rules are very lax, to be non existant.

This public statement hopefully will bring about change that the FFR imposes itself with a stricter set of rules, that say clubs are only allowed 6 players that cannot represent the national side.

This will have the positive effect of meaning all tems will prefer to develop talent and hence boost the national team, and it will also have less of a player drain on other nations, something the Welsh/English/Irish/SA/NZ/Aus unions will be happy with.

Time for FFR to get tough, they have shown that with statments regarding th eH-cup that they will stand up to clubs, and TBH if they did bring in something like a 5 NFQ rule they would have support of some big teams like Toulouse.

and TBH if they did bring in something like a 5 NFQ rule they would have support of some big teams like Toulouse..

They'd probably have 90% of the RABO teams behind them...

On top of the above

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/7980339.stm

French rugby is to limit the number of overseas players plying their trade domestically in their top-flight clubs

"The rule will start to be applied progressively, with 50% of home-grown players in 2010/11 and 70% as of the 2011/12 season," said the French rugby league (LNR).

What happened? don't think the Toulon team is 70% French or homegrown, and that was supposed to be in for last season?

GeordieFalcon wrote:"A guy like Chris Masoe wanted to come to Toulouse but we said no because we had Gilian Galan and preferred to work with a young Frenchman.

"But the problem is that youngsters need time to evolve, and we've run out of time."

Sad state of affairs...and French rugby could seriously suffer. The French Rugby Association need to be monitoring the whole direction of where all their teams are heading at the moment....

From a personal perspective England were bringing loads of foreign journeymen across, taking the place of promising local kids, but in recent years a change of direction and patience by the clubs as they blooded them has lead to the academies churning out talent, like Launchbury, Wade, May, Yarde, Slater, etc and the knock on effect is that it will benefit England.

I think a big driver for this are the financial incentives that the RFU provide the clubs. The FFR HAVE to pull their finger out and start working with the clubs.

Although I would say that if the top clubs have a load of top international players from around the SH the French players will just get displaced to the bottom 3/4 of the league. It would be the equivalent of inviting some S15 sides into the league. That in itself is not the reason for any French slump. The issue may be/become that they care more about the domestic game than international.

It's hard to get in laws that force the clubs to adhere to a set number of NFQ players as by European law it is illegal to restrict employment to other Europeans or citizens under the Kolpak agreenment. As such any attempted law could easily be overturned in court. RABO nations get away with it as they get large handouts from their union.

I do sympathize with coaches as most Unions are only interested in the international game and are happy to screw over the clubs that develop the talent. If a head coach wants to keep his job he needs to get results and that means he isn't likely to appreciate missing home internationals for a third of the season.

formerly known as Sam wrote:It's hard to get in laws that force the clubs to adhere to a set number of NFQ players as by European law it is illegal to restrict employment to other Europeans or citizens under the Kolpak agreenment. As such any attempted law could easily be overturned in court. RABO nations get away with it as they get large handouts from their union.

Nonsense, its perfectly legal because you can be any nationality in order to be national qualified.

Many guys who qualify for a nation on 3 year residency or grandparents rules are not citizens of the nation.

Nationality and Eligibility are different criteria. Because they can point to multiple nationalities all of whom are eligable there is no legal case to answer.

The calendar is the major problem. It's too crowded with rugby of every variety.

International rugby and the Top14 are now almost running in parallel. The FFR need to act to ensure they get enough internationals getting gametime whilst still getting access to them- their league is choking the life out of the national team.

Kingshu wrote:On top of the above

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/7980339.stm

French rugby is to limit the number of overseas players plying their trade domestically in their top-flight clubs

"The rule will start to be applied progressively, with 50% of home-grown players in 2010/11 and 70% as of the 2011/12 season," said the French rugby league (LNR).

What happened? don't think the Toulon team is 70% French or homegrown, and that was supposed to be in for last season?

Am not sure about the 70% being already implemented but the 50% homegrown is. The armitage brothers fall into that category (JIFFs) . The way forward would be to apply it to the starting 23 and not the the 40 player squad.
Noves is moaning but he wasnt complaining when he could attract the best SH players. Now they are turning toulouse down. He does have a point : Ex SH internationals are certainly better value for money than developping french players. The first thing to change is the calendar. Something has to give and the FFR needs to incentivise clubs who have french internationals.

The % of home grown players is a good idea, but will it have the unintended effect of encouraging French clubs to go overseas at an earlier age? Pick the good u.20's players, stick them in the academy for a few years and they are french qualified.

Bathman_in_London wrote:The % of home grown players is a good idea, but will it have the unintended effect of encouraging French clubs to go overseas at an earlier age? Pick the good u.20's players, stick them in the academy for a few years and they are french qualified.

Yep that's already the case specially with fidjians (vakatawa, nakaiciti and a few others). Our coaching at younger levels is quite poor and outdated to be honest which doesnt make it easy for the young born and bred french players to make it to the pro level (just look at how poor france has been recently at U20 an below). Can you believe you have to wait to be 14-15 yo to learn how to kick , tackle or lift properly?! No wonder if one day we will have fidjians wings and south african flankers.

Well the problem currently is that Fiji, Tongans, Samoans & South Africa I think don't constitute as foreigners under Koplak and other employment laws. I read one of the CEO's are the Sharks was moaning that since the FFR policy a lot of French academies are poaching youngsters from South Africa. This seems to be also the case with the other south sea islanders as there is a bigger focus on academy project scholarships. That could be a massively damaging issue for S15 Rugby if they pick off their youngsters.

I'm also concerned that players from other countries are given contracts specifically telling them to make themselves unavailable for national duty. This was the case for Fiji, Tonga & Samoa at the last World Cup. The IRB should have addressed the issue then but failed too. Instead they ducked out.

What prevents them doing this to larger nations? England & Ireland already select on home based policy. But what if Wales/Scotland/Italy are subjected to this?

Either way the clubs have their own agenda which is clear - win at all costs but will the LFR be able to halt them. I'm not so sure. It cant be right though.

Also to the above poster regarding that French league has enough teams to support many national sides I would say this:
How many nations actually select players from the bottom tier of their leagues? Not many. Why? Because confidence usually starts with your club form. If your fighting relegation are you likely to bring a positive & confident to your national side. Not likely. This is why through history the best national sides are usually made up of the most successful club sides (Leicester/Ospreys/Glasgow/Leinster/Crusaders/Red/Sharks etc). If France's top sides don't have French players in it, it would have to affect confidence levels in the national side.

LNR were the ones that annonced the 70% thing.

FFR and LNR have to work together to tighten this up, would it make sense for the FFR to try purchasing Toulouse and others and running them like IFRU run the Provinces?

Kingshu wrote:LNR were the ones that annonced the 70% thing.

FFR and LNR have to work together to tighten this up, would it make sense for the FFR to try purchasing Toulouse and others and running them like IFRU run the Provinces?

I could never see it happening. That ship has sailed IMO. The clubs have got too much cash to be bought.

Kingshu wrote:LNR were the ones that annonced the 70% thing.

FFR and LNR have to work together to tighten this up, would it make sense for the FFR to try purchasing Toulouse and others and running them like IFRU run the Provinces?

It would help for the FFR to maybe centrally contract some of the players but dont see that happening as the FFR does not want to spend a cent. They have a shiny new stadium to build and some travel expenses to pay, see.
I personally prefer the english way of incentivising clubs who have EPS players. Seems more adequate to a club structure. Or maybe bring a tax on foreign players with the proceeds to go to successful academies and grassroot rugby.

Even if the FFR purchased 4 of the 14 teams? or championship teams and brought them up.

FFR must be loaded, IRFU supports 4 teams, FFR doesn't support any, both have stadiums to pay off and FFR must get at least the same income as IRFU, should be a lot more.

It cost the FFR 2million euros everytime they use the stade de france...they would be better off paying back some debt and owning their own place... But yeah loaded they must be.

The French clubs are the dominant body in France which definitely hampers preparation for 6 N's etc. as the FFR appear too weak to make a player release and rest deal a al RFU.
However the pool of talent that Phipile Saint Andre has to choose from is still pretty deep. He has stubbornly refused to blood new 10's ( Lopez from Bordeaux or Tales at Castres) relying instead on an out of form Michelak as his playmaker in the 6 N's. He got the results that his selections deserved.

However he has picked these guys for the summer tour so it looks like he is waking up to the reality of picking in form players, which should help to galvanise the national side's fortunes in the long run.

Nationality and Eligibility are different criteria. Because they can point to multiple nationalities all of whom are eligable there is no legal case to answer.

Staggy if it was that easy the RFU would have already done it and the WRU would not be relying on a gentleman's agreement. Whatever way you spin it you cannot discriminate based on nationality and representing ones nation being a means of exclusion is not enforceable outside of an agreement with the clubs. The RFU tried and hence AP clubs were limited to 1 kolpak player outside of international periods. That doesn't work though as you look at Tigers who at the time had Mauger a Kiwi getting round it based in his Haitian grandmothers French passport and Ayerza the Puma getting round it based on the fact he was married to a Spaniard. You can offer incentives if an agreement cannot be reached though, which is what the RFU have resorted to.

The IRFU do it with no legal issues Sam. Ireland is a part of the EU and subject to the same laws as the others.

As explained it is not based on nationality is it based on eligibility.

You can be born in Australia, China, Pakistan or Iceland but if your fathers father was an Irishman you are fine to have a job no matter what your nationality.

Similarly your a born and bred American all your life. You move to France for univeristy and by the time you have finished you are eligible for the French team. Doesnt matter about your citizenship or nationality.

The reverse is also true. Irish guy born in Dublin, lived his whole life in Dublin decides to represent USA in a game of 7s as his Dad was born there. Wants to play for the Irish team but no longer can.

It isn't about discrimination based on nationality. It is about whether you have certain criteria that can apply to anyone, born anywhere in the world, with any passport in the world.

The IRFU are able to do it because they supply the regions with the majority of their funds. Who pays the piper names the tune. Same in Wales.

If the RFU and FFR could get away with it then it would already be in place.

red_stag wrote:The IRFU do it with no legal issues Sam. Ireland is a part of the EU and subject to the same laws as the others.

As explained it is not based on nationality is it based on eligibility.

You can be born in Australia, China, Pakistan or Iceland but if your fathers father was an Irishman you are fine to have a job no matter what your nationality.

Similarly your a born and bred American all your life. You move to France for univeristy and by the time you have finished you are eligible for the French team. Doesnt matter about your citizenship or nationality.

The reverse is also true. Irish guy born in Dublin, lived his whole life in Dublin decides to represent USA in a game of 7s as his Dad was born there. Wants to play for the Irish team but no longer can.

It isn't about discrimination based on nationality. It is about whether you have certain criteria that can apply to anyone, born anywhere in the world, with any passport in the world.

Plenty of things can be 'legal' until they're challenged in court. If a club went to the European Court to get it over turned I think they would win (this would apply if someone who was born in the UK couldn't work in the UK because of a quota). As Sam said, the Regions wouldn't challenge it as the WRU would just pull their funding.

sensisball wrote: The French clubs are the dominant body in France which definitely hampers preparation for 6 N's etc. as the FFR appear too weak to make a player release and rest deal a al RFU.
However the pool of talent that Phipile Saint Andre has to choose from is still pretty deep. He has stubbornly refused to blood new 10's ( Lopez from Bordeaux or Tales at Castres) relying instead on an out of form Michelak as his playmaker in the 6 N's. He got the results that his selections deserved.

However he has picked these guys for the summer tour so it looks like he is waking up to the reality of picking in form players, which should help to galvanise the national side's fortunes in the long run.

It's got nothing to do with weakness. The RFU paid an arm and leg for the current deal. As Whocares said, the FFR don't want to pay anything. Even the WRU pay the Regions for the extra time and they're as tight as something really tight.

formerly known as Sam wrote:The IRFU are able to do it because they supply the regions with the majority of their funds. Who pays the piper names the tune. Same in Wales.

If the RFU and FFR could get away with it then it would already be in place.

Disagree with this. If your an employer you cant just do what you want.

The IRFU do it because there is no political fallout.

It ain't the courts they fear. Its that it would be a straw that broke the strained tensions between club and country.

But the WRU isn't the employer. They fund the regions and as such they use their funding to influence the recruitment of the regions. Would the regions like to bring in some cheap foreign imports to help bolster their squad in crucial areas, hell yes, would the WRU cut their funding if a region broke the quota, yup.

The RFU have agreed at great length a deal for the release of players they are still technically the league's governing body but they wouldn't dare try and impose a similar quota as it would be squashed even quicker than LW got promoted.

looks like they've started their new recruitment policy:

http://www.planetrugby.com/story/0,25883,16024_8743802,00.html

pioden gorllewin wrote:looks like they've started their new recruitment policy:

http://www.planetrugby.com/story/0,25883,16024_8743802,00.html

Dont know why they need to justify themselves with the medical joker argument since this one is for next season. Also not sure what will happen to Matavanou who hasnt been playing much recently.

apparently bulls chiliboy ralepelle is another player on Toulouse shopping list.