6 Domestic players my arse

[East Coast Tiger]

Whats to stop Tonga and Somoa playing each other the week before the qualifying tournment and calling the teams Tonga A and Somoa A so that they have domestic qualified players. Or even just making some minor changes to the side and playing a local club team the week before and calling them somoa A. The rule seems so easy to abuse its not funny.

The most important rule though is one nation for life at least that way you know even if their only link to the country is through a grandparent theyre at least committed to representing the country.

I think players have to have played for an A team a year previous so such a game would have had to be played last year. I can't see that happening. But it's true the rules are dodgy. But at least this dodgy rule is supposed to give the game MORE credibility. The GP rule and the fact that players can jump from one nation to another only gives it LESS. So clearly the rules need to be looked at.

 

[rlinternational]

I haven't gone through this whole thread, but incase this hasn't been mentioned already, isn't the rule 6 players who have played in the domestic comp for at least 1 season, not 6 players from the current domestic season? So if there are 6 Samoans in the Samoan team who have played at least 1 season in Samoa, then that's absolutely fine then yeah? Or maybe they have players who were born and raised in Samoa and moved to Australia or NZ in their teen years and played league here, that should still be fine for them to play for Samoa.
Surely they must have players who have played in Samoa for at least 1 season otherwise they wouldn't be able to take part in qualifying, just because they are playing in Australia or NZ doesn't mean all of them were born here and only played here, I could be wrong about this but maybe people haven't looked into the Samoan players history well.

 

[East Coast Tiger]

I haven't gone through this whole thread, but incase this hasn't been mentioned already, isn't the rule 6 players who have played in the domestic comp for at least 1 season, not 6 players from the current domestic season? So if there are 6 Samoans in the Samoan team who have played at least 1 season in Samoa, then that's absolutely fine then yeah? Or maybe they have players who were born and raised in Samoa and moved to Australia or NZ in their teen years and played league here, that should still be fine for them to play for Samoa.
Surely they must have players who have played in Samoa for at least 1 season otherwise they wouldn't be able to take part in qualifying, just because they are playing in Australia or NZ doesn't mean all of them were born here and only played here, I could be wrong about this but maybe people haven't looked into the Samoan players history well.

True. I haven't looked into the history of every player in the Samoan squad, nor could I, but I'm willing to bet few if any have actually played in the Samoan domestic competition. Apart from anything else Samoa has hardly run a domestic competition in the past 10 years.

 

[hutch]

i had the full team lists for all 4 teams and planned on posting them but ive lost them somewhere, i think they may have been thrown out. ive got the match report of the fiji v cooks tho.

look, the samoans are all from aus or nz. its obvious none of them played in the local league. we dont even know the state of their local league. we know that both fiji and tonga have players in their sides that actually come from the local league.

for eg, the fijian team include players from saru, makoi and nadera. and they are players in key positions, the hooker, asaeli saravaki plays for nadera, the halfback and captain samesa cadrakilagi plays for saru. i remember reading the tongan team and they had a few players from their local league.

samoa have clearly broken the rules. if they are allowed to keep teamsw such as this one then why would they even bother to develop their local league. there is no incentive to do so. they couldust pick players from nz and aus every year. is the rlif going to do something about it? they should have already.

 

[bender]

No, you've misunderstood the "2nd tier" national side part of the equation. It means the 2nd tier side for a particular nation. So if an Australian born player with Fijian parents played for Fiji 'A' last year then he could play for the full Fiji team this year and count as one of the six domestic players in their squad.

It's not about 2nd tier nations in the international pecking order, but about the 2nd tier team for a particular country.

Why would it mean 2nd tier for a nation? As i said, that is completely ridiculous!. Why would any rule consider playing for the second string side more important than playing for the full national team. This is about getting players who commit to a country for more than just the World Cup Qualifiers. I could be wrong as i have only seen the rule as quoted on this thread, but I am fairly certain that you have misinterpreted. And now i think about it, the talk at the time of the Samoa v Tonga match was that all players playing in that match would quaify for the World Cup. Given that the official word so far has not mentioned breaching the rules (in a year when Georgia have already been kicked out apparently) I would guess that my interpretation is the correct interpretation.

Actually (thinking out loud again) wasnt there a large Australian Samoan contingent that played in a Pacific Cup in NZ and one in Sydney or Newcastle or somewhere, in the last 2 years. IF 6 players played in that competition then the rules are satisfied. At the end of the day, we have an exciting Samoa v Tonga game to decide who goes through to the world cup. What more could you ask for. All this squabbling over eligibility is ridiculous. How hollow would it be for Samoa to win this game and Tonga (for example) to finish last and make it through anyway. It would defeat the whole purpose of playing qualifiers which is to force sides to earn qualification, not to reward administrators who try hard.

 

[nadera78]

Sorry, but you've misread or misinterpreted the ruling.

It clearly states that to qualify as a 'domestic' player then you must have either played in the local comp for 1 year or played for a 2nd tier team for that country in the past. You need to read it again.

Either way, it was a fudge designed to appease NZ and Aus who weren't particularl intereted in making teams use local players. It was the RFL that was (quite rightly) pushing for local guys to be included.

 

[hitman51]

How about you post up the excact ruling that is writtin on the rule books and i mean the exact ruling on how these team are picked and how they should qualify not some assumption that most people on here have come up with. I want someone to post up the excact ruling from the rugby league international rule book,. All we ever here on here is this is what the ruling was now someone post up the actual facts from the rule book. ITs obvious that some of you have misinterpreted the rule book if samoa are in the worng then how come nothing has been done about it. Its simple nothing has been done cause they've nothing wrong. You whine about this doesnt help the game to grow domestically in the islands but none of you complained about the games being played in australia because how does playing these world cup qualifier in aussie help the game grow in the islands.

 

[nadera78]

I did, either earlier in this thread or in another one. It was a direct quote from the RLIF press release and it also had a link to the relevant page on the ARL website. I can't be bothered to go find it, but it's there if you want proof of the domestic player rule.

As to why any rule breach hasn't been investigated, well personally I don't think the ARL are particularly bothered because they didn't want the rule in the first place, it was the RFL that pushed for it. And it's the ARL that's running the comp and if they don't want to do something then......

 

[Turdy Angle]

The Samoan team listed on the rlif website includes the following names that could be domestic players;Simon Gercs and Conrad Ta’amoekiafa. They are the only names of the 18 listed that i don't recognise, so they could be locals, then again it could be that i just have never heard of them.

The 2nd condition listed by the rlif was that players could be counted as locals if they had played for that country's recognised 2nd team. ie an 'A' team or a student side. Samoa don't have either of those so none of the players could qualify that way.

Personally, I think it's crap. If the rules are laid down in advance and everyone know about them then they should be enforced. teams failing to comply should have the res**t reversed. Otherwise it's a complete waste of time.

None of the Samoa guys are locals because there is no local competition .

 

[brendothejet]

oh look polly warrior is back...

 

[Mr_Ugly]

None of the Samoa guys are locals because there is no local competition .

PW, from memory, despite your sh*t stirring, you generally seem to know what is going on in the islands.

I remember last year you (at least I think it was you) said that there were about 6 or so league sides in the Samoan comp, and that the standard was pretty low (which their results in the Pacific Cup later that year demonstrated).

Do you know for real if the Samoan league has fallen over, or are you just trying to get the boys to bite?

I moved about 5 months ago and haven't been getting my Rugby League Review, so aren't up to date with things over there.

 

[Turdy Angle]

Any comments on Samoa ?

 

[carlnz]

Any comments on Samoa ?

Yes because the team which Samoa sent over to the 2006 Pacific Cup in Auckland was all from Samoa.

 

[Turdy Angle]

Yes because the team which Samoa sent over to the 2006 Pacific Cup in Auckland was all from Samoa.

Just because Samoa sent a team of locals to a tournament it doesn't mean there is a local comp Carlnz.
How many international teams in league have played in tournaments and matches while there is no local comp ?
There have been a few articals in the Samoan papers regarding league and new people trying to restart the game like Tony Tuimavave and others .
But I know that the RL Review are full of shi* regarding Samoan rugby league and someone has also mention 23 rugby league clubs in Samoa last year which is also not true .

 

[ParraEelsNRL]

Just because Samoa sent a team of locals to a tournament it doesn't mean there is a local comp Carlnz.

WTF :roll:

 

[Turdy Angle]

I don't where those players came from but I know there wasn't a local comp last year .

 

[ParraEelsNRL]

So you're saying, 17 Samoan guys sitting at the pub watching Super Saturday decided to form a Samoan National team to go to NZ to play in this comp?

Or is it you have no idea at all and as usual just making things up?

 

[Turdy Angle]

So you're saying, 17 Samoan guys sitting at the pub watching Super Saturday decided to form a Samoan National team to go to NZ to play in this comp?

Or is it you have no idea at all and as usual just making things up?

Parra ! You have a very short memory . The last Samoan team to participate in the last League World 7s in Sydney were all rugby union players because there wasn't any league players in Samoa .
Remember when the SRFU complained about it ?;-)
The local team that participate at the pacific cup in Auckland was a local rural villiage rugby union team coach by then SRL sectertary Rev Hemi [SIZE=-1]Faaeafaleupolu .

Why don't you buy the Samoan papers in Sydney Parra ? Most Indian shops in Sydney sells them .
[/SIZE]

 

[ParraEelsNRL]

Parra ! You have a very short memory . The last Samoan team to participate in the last League World 7s in Sydney were all rugby union players because there wasn't any league players in Samoa .
Remember when the SRFU complained about it ?;-)
The local team that participate at the pacific cup in Auckland was a local rural villiage rugby union team coach by then SRL sectertary Rev Hemi [SIZE=-1]Faaeafaleupolu .

Why don't you buy the Samoan papers in Sydney Parra ? Most Indian shops in Sydney sells them .
[/SIZE]

:lol:

Yes, all RL players are always union players.

 

[Turdy Angle]

Yes, there is no local comp in Samoa .;-)