What would be fair international qualification rules?

First topic message reminder :

Ban the grandma inheritance rule would be one for me. Take that down to mum.

And an appropriate residency rule* should be dependent on age - with:

at least seven years for over 20s and

From age 15 or less - 0 years
From age 17 or less - 1 year
From age 18 or less - 2 years
From age 19 or less - 3 years
From age 20 or less - 5 years

*(all of which whilst competing as RU registered players).

snoopster wrote:

Kiwireddevil wrote:True. And it'd become easy for a country who wanted to boost their team to make citizenship easier to get for likely prospects.

Do you think this is a real possibility?
It is something I think it extremely unlikely - I'd think New Zealand is the only country who is rugby focused enough for it to be possible (though still not probable - it would I think require a massive loss of form for a prolonged period) and even then pride is likely to get in the way, as it would be admitting that they can't produce enough good players on their own and need to gain an unfair advantage over the rest of the rugby world.

A fair point. I was more thinking in terms of somewhere like Russia (if Putin etc suddenly developed a passion for the game), or anywhere with a somewhat dictatorial regime.

Scrap grandparent rule.

If you represent a nation at full international level in any sport then that is the nation you must represent in all sport.

3 year residency rule if under 18, 5 year residency rule if you dont have the 3 year qualification by your 18th birthday.

Simples.

The citizenship arguement is far too easy to abuse.

maestegmafia wrote:I am preference the IRB stated that no laws would be changed prior to the RWC 2011.

But I imagine that many aspect of the game will be put under close scrutiny after.

I hope that the residency laws are up for re classification then.

There's a difference between Laws of the Game and tournament rules Maesteg.

For instance the extra prop sub is a rule which is adopted in some competitions and not others.

HammerofThunor wrote:We've got that now. I don't think the IRB made it up on a whim. They discussed it and came up with the "best" one from their point of view at the time.

I'll try a different tack, what is the point of the eligibility regulations? Why have them at all? What do we want internation rugby to be?

A great point. International sport always used to kind of be a "our country is better than your country" and it was fairly rare for people to live the other side of the world for just a couple of years, or even to move to another part of the UK and/or Ireland for a brief time. In those days it would've been fairly easy to say who was Australian, South African, English, Welsh etc (I'm sure there were exceptions I don't need to be told specific ones).

Nowadays it's all very blurred anyway. My brother was born in Australia. He spent 6 months living there (from 0 - 6 months obviously) and once visited for a few weeks when he was about 12. Should he be allowed to play for Australia? Does the fact his (English) mother was on Australian soil, living with his (English) father when she gave birth mean that he is truly Australian? What makes someone Australian (or any other nationality)?

With all this mud in the water how do we want to classify international rugby? The best players whose mothers were on your national soil when they gave birth? The best players currently living in your country? The best players who learned their rugby in your country?

When our team wins, what are we trying to prove? It used to be that say Leicester rugby club was a group of players from Leicester who were supported by people from Leicester. When they won the supporters could say that Leicester produced better rugby players. Club teams now contain people from all over, in rare cases they could have a team where not a single one of them is originally from the area. Has this made club rugby worse or better? Should international rugby go down this type of road? E.g. "Club New Zealand"? I'm guessing most would say no.

I would say it is the best players that share a common culture of that nation. I have not the foggiest how you could actually define this in a set of rules.

As an aside, the most tenuous link to a national team must be Budge Poutney. Born and raised in Southampton he had a grandmother from the channel Isles. If you're from the Channel Isles you can choose which of England, Wales or Scotland you represent. Hence Budge chose his Grandmother to be Scottish and played for Scotland!

TheGreyGhost wrote:I'd just be happy if guys who've represented one country professionally can't represent another one a couple of years later.

Also think that playing for team other than the national squad should count. For example, the NZ Maori, Junior AB's.

Actually personally, I think once you've represented a province, or region you should be bound to that country indefinitely. Note that I say province or region and not club or franchise.

Point 1 - I think most would agree

Point 2 - I think most would agree

Point 3 - Not sure how that would work as not all countries operate a provincial / regional game (The English County level competition for example is already marginalised), if it goes to school / University level where for example you might represent Kent schools or English Universities, but that may be a bit unfair on foreign pupils who attend an English or British School / University

Schools.Universities are different. For example Stuart Barnes went to school in Monmouth in Wales so he played for Welsh schools. Doesn't make him Welsh.

My point exactly

IL
Agree with your #1 - remove the grandparent qualificatin.

regarding #3, I think that there should be preferential treatment for those who moved to a country as a child (i.e. before the age of 18), so say 3 years residency qualification for them and a longer period for those who move as adults (I think at least 5 years, and your proposed 7 years isn't too bad).

Your #2 could be a bit problematic, especially in the UK, where you may live one side of a national border but attend school on the other side - Ryan Giggs represented (indeed captained) England schools football team, but could only have qualified for the full England football side through residence as he was born in Wales of Welsh parents. Also, Martin Johnston represented New Zealand at age group level when he spent one year there, yet no-one would dispute that he's English.

I think GG is probably closer to the fairest answer, in saying that if you have played representative senior rugby in one country (i.e. 7s, A teams, regional select teams) you are committed to that country - i.e. making the commitment based on a broader definition of representation.

I would also suggest that representing a country at rugby league should preclude you from representing another country at rugby union. However, that causes some wider questions of where do you draw the line regarding representation in other sports.

The regional rugby tie is a horrible idea in my opinion.
Say you have a kid born to Irish parents in Cork but the family then moved to Woking when he was 2 years old and has lived there ever since - if he turns out to be great at rugby and only considers himself Irish, he's suddenly excluded from playing for his county/ region of England he's been raised if he wants to keep his hope of playing for Ireland alive (and there is no sure thing he will ever play for Ireland, just that he will miss out on a level of rugby to give himself a chance)
That seems deeply unfair to me - being tied to an international team should be purely based on playing for that international team at senior level, be it the Sevens or A team or the full team. Adding regional rugby onto that is a way to tie down a lot of players who have no chance of playing for the full side to stop them playing for anyone else regardless of their ties to that region.

I cant help but feel that when a guy is capable of playing international rugby, and especially if hes capable of lighting up the stage at the highest levels then sometimes we also owe it to him and to ourselves to find a way for him to do so, whoever he ends up playing for.

Kiwireddevil wrote:A fair point. I was more thinking in terms of somewhere like Russia (if Putin etc suddenly developed a passion for the game), or anywhere with a somewhat dictatorial regime.

Ah, true - it isn't a problem currently but I can see it could be in the future. Places like Qatar are probably a good bet for it - Russia might have too much of a national prestige thing to do it.

It depends on what you're regional systems are supposed to be. Are they the best players in that region? Is it a step below national representation? These are two seperate things.

Why should playing league fix qualifcation and nothing else? If all sports do why limit it to sport? If someone represents New Zeland in some sort of international spelling competition should this fix the nationality? If not, why not? The lines got to be drawn somewhere and where ever that is will be arbitrary.

The granting of citizenship should be left out of the equation.

Zola Budd was granted that for socio-political expediency.

And another thing - permanently tying yourself to a nation may have it's own repercussions.

Imagine a player was excluded from selection on political or religious grounds by a government or sporting body.

Or a player as a matter of conscience excluded himself from his home nation.

Should there be a mechanism whereby the athlete can appeal the rule?

Portnoy wrote:The granting of citizenship should be left out of the equation.

Zola Budd was granted that for socio-political expediency.

I don't think it should be tied to it completely but as a rough guide should we ask players to be in residency longer than it would take to become a citizen? Would they then not be second class citizens? I suppose we already do this as some one who was capped at 18 for on country could go on to live for 10 years in another, gain citizenship but can't represent them. Or even represent the country he was born in and grew up in because he played for his granddad's country at 18.

Is it just me who thinks this is being made more complicated than it needs to be. There appears to be two problems. Lenght of residency and the presence of the Granny Rule.

red_stag wrote:Is it just me who thinks this is being made more complicated than it needs to be. There appears to be two problems. Lenght of residency and the presence of the Granny Rule.

Agreed. In fact it's the same points that I discussed on 606 over a year ago and I'm sure that wasn't the first time. I think most people want to get rid of the grand parents rule and to increase the residency period. People disagree over how long the residency should be and if there should be any difference for under 18s etc, but most are singing from the same song sheet.

red_stag wrote:Is it just me who thinks this is being made more complicated than it needs to be. There appears to be two problems. Lenght of residency and the presence of the Granny Rule.

In an ideal world Stag.

But if you start peeling an onion...

Incidently:

This was on planet rugby. The lad has lived in Australia for 5 years but was born and raised Tongan. Under most of our rules this would be fine (indeed I am OK with it, it's his choice at the end of the day).

THE WORD "THIS" IS A HYPERLINK

I think most people agree that:
1 - Grandparent's place of birth is a little too distant to be a sensible criterion (and noting the Budge Poultney case, where a Channel Island grandparent gave him a choice of home nations to represent).

2 - The current residency period of 3 years feels a little short in a world where professional players travel the world to earn their living playing the sport. Whether this should be extended to 5, 7 or even 10 years, and how you deal with people who moved prior to turning 18 (or prior to becoming professional players) are points of discussion but I don't think vex most of us in the same way as with players who move for purely professional rugby reasons.

Points of greater disagreement:

3 - Whether the definition of representative rugby should be broadened so that e.g. playing for an age group international team or a regionally representative side (i.e. a 'select' side rather than a regional franchise as operating in Wales or Ireland) counts as a declaration of nationality.

4 - Whether participation in other international sports should have an influence on elligibility for a specific rugby Union. To me, intuitively it 'feels' wrong that a player can represent New Zealand at Rugby League and then England at Rugby Union, but if you impose this rule, surely logic demands that representing any country at another international sport disqualifies you from representing another country at RU.

But why is it so wrong say, that a PI player who maybe has had a cap or 2 with NZ but with the prospect of no more should not go on and represent Samoa or Fiji like a few years ago?. It is messy but surely that would help the PI nations to put out stronger teams.

lostinwales wrote:But why is it so wrong say, that a PI player who maybe has had a cap or 2 with NZ but with the prospect of no more should not go on and represent Samoa or Fiji like a few years ago?. It is messy but surely that would help the PI nations to put out stronger teams.

As a theory I don't disagree with that - it would be good for rugby... but I think the reality seems to be just too much of a messy situation.
I presume the case would be that players who have played for a top nation could take a break from international rugby then go and play for a nation a level down? But what happens if they then improve the team enough for it to move up the rankings above a team seen as one of the top ones? Do the previously capped players have to stop playing for them? Does the team they leapfrogged get to recruit some ex-All Blacks as well?

snoopster wrote:

lostinwales wrote:But why is it so wrong say, that a PI player who maybe has had a cap or 2 with NZ but with the prospect of no more should not go on and represent Samoa or Fiji like a few years ago?. It is messy but surely that would help the PI nations to put out stronger teams.

As a theory I don't disagree with that - it would be good for rugby... but I think the reality seems to be just too much of a messy situation.
I presume the case would be that players who have played for a top nation could take a break from international rugby then go and play for a nation a level down? But what happens if they then improve the team enough for it to move up the rankings above a team seen as one of the top ones? Do the previously capped players have to stop playing for them? Does the team they leapfrogged get to recruit some ex-All Blacks as well?

Good point Snoopster. Possibly the only fair-ish way would be to allow 1 career nation switch, and in order to make the switch the player would have to declare "I wish to switch countries" and THEN serve a 5 year stand-down. It's unlikely too many players would be prepared to take the risk of being still international class in 5 years time unless they genuinely felt an attachment to their new country (or had completely burnt their bridges with their old one). As an additional requirement maybe they could also already be qualified for their new country when they start their stand down.

Snoopster, that's the argument that got me. How do you define the sides the you can get your 'second' caps from? Anyone? Tier 2 (whatever that is) sides?

As a side note, why limit someone who played some other sport? Should any representation for a country count? Why only sport? What is a 'sport'?