Residency Rules

First topic message reminder :

I was thinking about the following scenario last night:

SA player comes to Ireland and plays there for 2 seasons. He goes very well and decides actually he wants to give another crack to playing international Rugby for his home nation. He returns to SA. Things don't pan out and after 2/3 seasons he returns to the club he played for in Ireland. Having already been there for 2 seasons, would he be eligible after 1 year or does the residency clock reset itself?

I'd like to ban foreign coaches at national level.

Wouldn't that punish the smaller rugby nations? Or do you mean above a certain level?

nganboy wrote:I'd like to ban foreign coaches at national level.

Why?

I wouldn't agree with that one.

I don't care about second string kiwis and saffers playing for Ireland and Scotland.

It does seem to be more of an issue where pacific island nations lose many of their potential best players to wealthier nations before they even gain a cap. Nathan Hughes is the perfect example here. That feels wrong somehow, but then on the other hand who are we to deny individuals their right to choose.

going to be a messy one for World Rugby this one...

Totally agree about Nathan Hughes....I really don't want him to play for England.

Gooseberry wrote:

SecretFly wrote:All joking aside.  It is an issue.  
But we have to closely control the systems that get us those guys rather than prospective soulless players who simply want to play on any International side to further their careers and add to their personal value.

To be fair I think that is a problem for everyone, including many players.
The issues I have stem from the perception its just England who do it, or in the north that its just the all blacks who do it. Or indeed that its purely driven by who has the most cash. Its not, South Africa are pretty much the only top 12 nation without a large number of "qualified" players in their recent history.
The other big issue is that you couldn't realistically set up a rule that stops citizens from playing for the country of their passport, but citizenship is very easy to come by in some countries compared to others. Blanket taking away the residency rule or extending it to 5 years might well reduce the total number of plastic caps, but might actually create a stronger market for it in certain nations and see an increased player drain from others.

Maybe they should get Nigel Farrage in to vet any applicants for the England side.  Avoid all those immigrants like Burgess who came over here for the money.

I think you will find that Russell Crowe recruited Sam Burgess for the Rabittohs from up North where they paly a little bit of league. But he has come home for the money!!!!!!

Waldrom did qualify by residency too but as he qualified he found out his grandparent was born in oldham or something so really it was only after he had served 3 years notice.

The problem with any residency rule is that that it is patently unfair. Professional rugby players will only move to countries to play rugby so that means that only those countries with professional leagues stand a chance of getting additional players qualifying on residency. So the countries already with established pro-rugby benefit, while countries that cannot attract professionals lose out. This is obviously discriminatory and implies that residency should not be allowed at all as a means to qualify.

Having no residency qualification though would discriminate against guys who moved to a country as a child and despite having spent the majority of their life there potentially wouldn't qualify. How is it possible to define how long someone must reside in a country to qualify?

My proposal is simple - for a player to qualify on residency (only) they have to have spent the majority of their life there.

For example take (say) Pedro who is now 18 year old and has spent the last seven years in England but the other 11 early years in Scotland?

So in the example above Pedro could qualify for Scotland immediately, because he has spent the majority of his life there already. To qualify for England he would have to spend an additional 4 years living there until he had cumulatively spent the majority of his life in England.

Another example is 21 y.o. Bakkies who was born in Scotland of South African parents. He moved to England as a baby, lived there until he was 4 and then moved to Sydney before studying in England for the past three years. He of course qualifies for both Scotland and SA by right, but using the majority rule he also qualifies for Australia since he has spent the majority of his life there (14 years). To qualify for England he would have to reside there for another 7 years under majority residency.

I think such a system could be refined to make allowances for grandparents. If say Bakkies had an English Grandmother then he gets a 5 year deduction, so he would only have a 2 year residency qualifying period. If he also unearthed an English grandfather then he wouldn't have any time to make up at all.

The point of this is to stop the invidious poaching of promising players of (increasingly) young age groups, because their new adopted home couldn't touch them until they had at least spent the majority of their life there.

Naming a kid Bakkies! I reckon he gave himself the nickname to hide his English ancestry, takes your toughguy image a few notches down that's for sure.

GeordieFalcon wrote:Fa
Increasing the residency whould stop a lot of what you said there. I'd like longer, but I think 5 yrs would have the desired affect. Certainly the likes of Flutey etc wouldn't have played probably.

As for the grandparent rule, I just think it offers nothing.

Take Thomas Waldrom for example. He qualified on that rule...had never been to the country and suddenly was playing for England. Now that can happen under the parents rule, but I just think Grandparents is one step too far.
Just my opinion of course.

But those two steps would sort a lot of the issues out.

I'd also like to add the cross nationality changing. If you play for one country in League, you play for the same in Union and vice versa. No chopping and changing like Henry Paul, Brad Thorn etc.

I'd agree with scrapping the grandparent rule, though perhaps it would be better to replace it with a more nuanced parental rule - despite his accident of birth neither my father nor I regard ourselves as even slightly Welsh, but we both thought of ourselves as Scottish in our youth - and I would not have been able to play for them without a grandparent rule.

Likewise, I still think 5 years is too long - which is why I suggested linking the residency rule to some metric of putting down roots.

Disagree with stopping cross-code nationality changing. Mo Fa'asavalu played league after being capped for Samoa in union as it was the only contract he could get. He ended up playing league for England, and again I don't begrudge him that because if he has a shot at earning more by using his talents at a higher level then that's fine - especially for a guy who is supporting an extended family in an impoverished nation.

That's why I think a different rule for Tier 2 / developing nations should be seriously considered.

I agree poorfour when a kiwi's AB career is finished he should be able to move to the ospreys, earn some money and play for Wales!

only kidding chaps. I agree actually. If it helps to build stronger tier 2 competition esp with many PI kiwi's wanting to play for their ancestral homeland once their AB career is over. It would help the competitiveness which is a little shallow overall.

Likewise, I still think 5 years is too long - which is why I suggested linking the residency rule to some metric of putting down roots.

Why is it too long. Its about representing nations. If people want to come here to play for clubs and earn money fine nothings stopping them...but they should still play for their nation be it samoa, Fiji, Botswana, Germany...who ever.

Disagree with stopping cross-code nationality changing. Mo Fa'asavalu played league after being capped for Samoa in union as it was the only contract he could get. He ended up playing league for England, and again I don't begrudge him that because if he has a shot at earning more by using his talents at a higher level then that's fine - especially for a guy who is supporting an extended family in an impoverished nation.

Again I don't see an argument. Play for one team and play for it in the other code...quite simple. Doesn't stop you going to big clubs to earn money. Just play for the nation you picked.

That's why I think a different rule for Tier 2 / developing nations should be seriously considered.

If a player has one ab cap and discarded, then after so many years he should be able to play for a tier 2 side. I could go along with that....but it would need to be monitored very closely.....and im not totally comfy with it.

worse still geordie, if you play for a respected A side, you can't play for anyone else.

The Great Aukster wrote:The problem with any residency rule is that it is patently unfair. Professional rugby players will only move to countries to play rugby so that means that only those countries with professional leagues stand a chance of getting additional players qualifying on residency. So the countries already with established pro-rugby benefit, while countries that cannot attract professionals lose out. This is obviously discriminatory and implies that residency should not be allowed at all as a means to qualify.

Having no residency qualification though would discriminate against guys who moved to a country as a child and despite having spent the majority of their life there potentially wouldn't qualify. How is it possible to define how long someone must reside in a country to qualify?

My proposal is simple - for a player to qualify on residency (only) they have to have spent the majority of their life there.

For example take (say) Pedro who is now 18 year old and has spent the last seven years in England but the other 11 early years in Scotland?

So in the example above Pedro could qualify for Scotland immediately, because he has spent the majority of his life there already. To qualify for England he would have to spend an additional 4 years living there until he had cumulatively spent the majority of his life in England.

Another example is 21 y.o. (Bakkies) Brenda who was born in Scotland of South African parents. He moved to England as a baby, lived there until he was 4 and then moved to Sydney before studying in England for the past three years. He of course qualifies for both Scotland and SA by right, but using the majority rule he also qualifies for Australia since he has spent the majority of his life there (14 years). To qualify for England he would have to reside there for another 7 years under majority residency.

I think such a system could be refined to make allowances for grandparents. If say (Bakkies) Brenda had an English Grandmother then he gets a 5 year deduction, so he would only have a 2 year residency qualifying period. If he also unearthed an English grandfather then he wouldn't have any time to make up at all.

The point of this is to stop the invidious poaching of promising players of (increasingly) young age groups, because their new adopted home couldn't touch them until they had at least spent the majority of their life there.

fa0019 wrote:Naming a kid Bakkies! I reckon he gave himself the nickname to hide his English ancestry, takes your toughguy image a few notches down that's for sure.

Changed it just for you... to a name to toughen up to.

fa0019 wrote:worse still geordie, if you play for a respected A side, you can't play for anyone else.

Absolutely...and we should even take that down to the U20 level.

The Moriarty case recently. He is very much a Welshman with all his family history, ties etc....yet he played for England U20 and has now played for Wales senior side.

No no no no no no.

Once you choose your tied. He should have picked Wales U20...

Would have screwed us with Martin Johnson playing for the ABs u20's but hey ho. I cant be hypocritical and want it one way but not another.

nganboy wrote:I'd like to ban foreign coaches at national level.

At the very least I'd like the rules on all support staff to match those of the players.

Ah I think it should be a bit more lenient on coaches.

For 2nd tier teams like Wales and Ireland its been crucial getting Kiwi coaches....

Just seems odd to me you have all the comments about searching the globe and poaching players yet the NH teams seem to do the same for coaching. If we want to tighten residency, which I'd like to see made longer or some sort of U16 rule etc, we should at least acknowledge the amount of coaches involved abroad who can walk in without any residency and still coach more than 1 nation.

I can see your point and if it was brought in I wouldn't complain. We have some great young coaches in England and they would get good exposure (which I think they do already)

My only argument is that they aren't actually on the pitch...they are simply bringing new ideas and training skills to the team.

Something that Eddie Jones appears to have with the Japanese side.
Taking that away could potentially hurt 2/3/4/5 tier sides who are progressing.

I think its slightly unfair on kids to place such restrictions on them. In the end, they can't even vote  <18. The England selectors knew Moriarty, they knew his family and no doubt they would have had a chat with him about it. Everyone knew he would probably end up choosing Wales given the specific circumstances.

However it simply gives incentives for nations to undercut each other. That is wrong. It should be a uniform rule for all.

GF, that's always rolled out but how much are the coaches and players being held back by using residency and foreign coaches in this way? Have them in your domestic leagues but nationally there should be stricter rules for me.

FA

Are you telling me at 18 you don't know what country you follow or want to represent...????

GeordieFalcon wrote:FA

Are you telling me at 18 you don't know what country you follow or want to represent...????

I agree with fa0019. It is unfair for teams to restrict the careers of young players who may know no better and end up getting one A cap and then never getting picked again or have the opportunity of choosing another nation they would otherwise have qualified for.

For those who have no option at 18 everyone will know what country they follow, but for those who have several options it is not necessarily that clear cut.

The issue is Test rugby full stop, everything else is just a development or a trial. Why should playing for a designated A team never mind age grade tie anyone to that country? The purpose of those games is to ultimately prepare players for Test rugby and they will be fully capped if they make the grade. If a Union want to tie a player to them for life then they should do the honourable thing and give them a full Test cap - simples.

The residency rule is as lax as the designated team tie is draconian.

Early caps are being used for Wales consistently now for players who qualify for more than 1 country. dangle the carrott and tie players in.

Aukster,
The problem with test rugby is that theres so much chopping and changing its like a merry go round - its like a premium level club championship. Soon nationality will be meaningless.

Very shortly there'll be more PI players in the European sides than in the PI sides!!

its a modern world Geordie and people often have split loyalities. Their are few people that I know (well outside of SA) who are pure Scots/Irish/English/Welsh. etc. They may love their home country, but their blood may be of another which does mean something.

Take Morgan of England. English born and raised (albeit with his surname). Played professionally in Wales enough to qualify and was called up by both... but declined to get his head straight until he chose England a few months later... and this was in his 20s. He took the sensible decision but he could have easily have taken the first team that asked him.

I don't imagine it's ever easy for people such as above.

Morgan to be fair never qualified for Wales and made the decision early to move back and aim for England. Someone like Francis may be better, qualified for Wales and England but was asked by Wales first and had gone with them. Similar to Moriarty, Cuthberty et al. We have the born and bred Scottish lad whos name escapes me playing tight head for newcastle as well. Has pledged himself to England though.

Gooseberry wrote:South Africa should entice some Kiwis over to fill their quota of All Blacks, they are the only major test nation without any in the set up.

If your an AB you cant play for anyone else

I think there are multiple cuts at the residency issue.  

Clearly, the Home Nations have a mostly unique situation.  My real country of loyalty is UK.  My favourite 'national team' is England.  There are a rapidly increasing number of people with parents or grandparents from the different UK nations.  Not sure how we can exactly define residency or nationality when we have freedom of movement across the UK and have backgrounds which muddy the context of nationality in the UK context.

The separate issue, which I believe is more important, is the movement of players from outside the UK, the most common being the PI, Kiwis, and South Africans.  I agree the residency time period is too short and should be increased by a minimum of one year, but two is better.  This prevents the short-ish term planning and player development.  The grandparent rule, I believe, should be dropped, and limited to parents only.  This does not limit player movement to play for clubs (within league rules), but certainly for international teams.  

Another problem is how to provide the proper incentives for players to not abandon their national home to move to more lucritive countries.  There will always be countries financially stronger and other weaker.  So movement is inevitable.  Ultimately, I think this is the problem, and not sure how to make it lucrative for players to continue to represent their orginal countries.

This does not limit player movement to play for clubs (within league rules), but certainly for international teams.

This is exactly what im trying to say Dr.

Increasing the residency wont harm players chances of getting lucrative deals for clubs...but it will stop this international merry go round which is just making it all a bit of a farce.

Nathan Hughes being a prime example.

GeordieFalcon wrote:

This does not limit player movement to play for clubs (within league rules), but certainly for international teams.

This is exactly what im trying to say Dr.

Increasing the residency wont harm players chances of getting lucrative deals for clubs...but it will stop this international merry go round which is just making it all a bit of a farce.

Nathan Hughes being a prime example.

Completely agree!
What do you think is the main barrier to this? I have heard some people say they believe some unions might want to preserve the status quo to give larger player pools?

doctor_grey wrote:I think there are multiple cuts at the residency issue.  

Clearly, the Home Nations have a mostly unique situation.  My real country of loyalty is UK.  My favourite 'national team' is England.  There are a rapidly increasing number of people with parents or grandparents from the different UK nations.  Not sure how we can exactly define residency or nationality when we have freedom of movement across the UK and have backgrounds which muddy the context of nationality in the UK context.

The separate issue, which I believe is more important, is the movement of players from outside the UK, the most common being the PI, Kiwis, and South Africans.  I agree the residency time period is too short and should be increased by a minimum of one year, but two is better.  This prevents the short-ish term planning and player development.  The grandparent rule, I believe, should be dropped, and limited to parents only.  This does not limit player movement to play for clubs (within league rules), but certainly for international teams.  

Another problem is how to provide the proper incentives for players to not abandon their national home to move to more lucritive countries.  There will always be countries financially stronger and other weaker.  So movement is inevitable.  Ultimately, I think this is the problem, and not sure how to make it lucrative for players to continue to represent their orginal countries.

Doctor Grey. Why keep the residency rule at all? It obviously discriminates in favour of the rich rugby nations at the expense of the poorer ones. If the qualifying period is increased then younger and younger players will get scouted and offered school/university scholarships thus further denuding those financially weak countries of players. Scrap qualification through residency altogether or at the least introduce ‘majority residency’ as outlined above, and that takes away the opportunity to buy talent.

The grandparent rule is at least consistent for all nations and increases the pool of players for everyone without discrimination. As you rightly point out the problem is financial, so the key is to remove the possibility of rich countries ‘buying’ talent, and AFAIK it is still impossible to buy a granny (at least for rugby qualification!).

Making it lucrative to play Test rugby is really a club v country one. A professional rugby player will have to play for a club and many nations do not have professional leagues, so that player will have to move to another country if he is to earn a living. The problem is that it is increasingly lucrative for these players to only play club rugby at the expense of playing Test rugby for ANY country. That is a very different issue that World Rugby should be addressing.

I suspect that a move to footballs qualification would be a start. I.e. 5 years above 18 spent in the nation. I like the majority rule (i.e. move at 5 means qualify at 10, 10, means 20, 15 means 30). Football also provides for an exemption which is usually easy and quick to get if you haven't moved for purely football reasons. Only organisations like the NZFA who fail to to do this get pinged.

I suspect that a move to football's qualification system would be frowned upon without even a second glance!