PARENT RULE

[dimitri]

with a world cup likely to be held in the next 5 years we need to look at this rule.

Even though rugby yawnyawn uses the grandparent rule they seem to be able to mask it behind their clever marketing ploys

many players were playing for countries like USA who had never even been there and nothing was said. Yet when that happened in the RLWC it was all over the news.

I think the grandparent rule needs to be cut back to a PARENT rule.

This rule would be very legitimate!

When we are asked what nationality we are we normally talk aabout our mother and father.

EG being half greek and half italian etc etc

and its also quite styraight forward to get a passport to a country where your parents are born.

I think this would help the image of the tournament tremendously

and wouldnt effect team like LEBANON which had at least 7 players born in lebanon, and the majority had parents born there!!!!

 

[Eskimo Sharkie]

many players were playing for countries like USA who had never even been there and nothing was said. Yet when that happened in the RLWC it was all over the news.

Unfortunately, you would still have the same problem with a "parent" rule. This is a problem in every sport and, personally, I have no problem with whatever criteria is applied if it means that we can have more international teams at the RLWC. The big problem that needs to be sorted out is the one of precedence, if you have a player with say an English father, an American mother, born in New Zealand while both parents were living there because of a work placement, but migrated to Australia with his parents at a young age and now only holds an Australian passport and has played all his football here? Who gets dibs on the guy?

By birth he is a New Zealander, but is currently an Australian. Through ancestry, he could get a passport to the UK (we'll ignore the Euro aspect) or the US. How about whichever country is lowest ranked internationally. Under the above scenario, the US would have first option to include him in their squad. If they failed to qualify for the RLWC Finals, then the next lowest ranked country could include him in their squad, so that he could play for England. This would serve the even up the competition at an international level and it would be an interesting exercise to go through the Australian squad to see what effect this would have. I don't have the time to go and research this, but if anyone does, I'd appreciate it if you could post the results.

 

[East Coast Tiger]

There is a massive difference between the parent rule and the grandparent rule. No one can rightly question a players right to play for a country based on the parent rule as many people still recognise their nationality based on where one or both of their parents are from. For example: I've got a mate who was born in Wales, lived in Wales all his life until he moved to Australia about 7 or 8 years ago. So what is his nationality? Ask him and he'd say Englsih. I wouldn't even dare to suggest he's Welsh and risk a kicking. His parents are English, so that's that. If he were an RL player should he be told he couldn't play for England? No because the parent rule is legitimate and fair.

This cannot be said about the GR. Few if any people recognise their nationality throught their grandparents, especially in Australia. As a result there is little credibility in RL when the public is told most of the players in certain teams are only qualified to play through (often only 1) grandparent/s.

Yes they do do this in Union, and soccer, but as has been well established we are not treated like they are. We are treated badly in almost all circumstances. Therefore we need to give ourselves some credibility, so that the knockers out there have nothing to shout about.

Like dimitri correctly pointed out, Lebanon won't be badly affected if the GR is scrapped and I'm sure other nations that have relied on GR players could also field strong professional teams just using parent and birth rule players.

 

[dimitri]

There is a massive difference between the parent rule and the grandparent rule. No one can rightly question a players right to play for a country based on the parent rule as many people still recognise their nationality based on where one or both of their parents are from

i totally agree


i also think the parent rule is a lot more marketable


then if the rugby yawnyawn boring officials do their usual thing and try and belittle our world event

then geoff carr or colin love or maurice lindsay or whoever should hold a press conference and talk about yawnyawn teams like USA etc etc etc

who were filled with GRANDPARENT PLAYERS


THAT WOULD SHUT UP JOHNNY AND HIS CRONIES

 

[Jeffles]

If you want a Parent rule you should be prepared for some major thrashing in a RLWC. I notice you have also advocated a 16 team RLWC at some point. Dimitri you are writing the recipe for a disaster of a RLWC.

The Grandparent Rule gets bad press in RL (dsespite being used in other circles) because of the intensity at which the rule is applied in RL. Unfortunately it actually brings some sides to a decent standard. It is a double edged sword.

Perhaps a long term plan to limit the GPR to 5 or 6 people per side may be in order. But it can't happen in 4 years. When some more established development occurs in emerging nations and locally bred players can displace descendants of nationals, then we should look at reducing the GPR.

 

[East Coast Tiger]

We could make international team very competitive if we allowed anyone to pay for them. If fact why don't we just stick international jerseys on NRL teams and send them out? I nominate the Roosters to be Wales and I suppose the Bulldogs would have to be Lebanon.

The parent rule would allow teams to stay reasonably competitive without creating a farcical situation open to ridicule that could turn a potentially great RLWC into another laugh-a-thon for union and the rest. No one calls the UWC a joke coz 1) they market themselves right and flood the media with hype and patriotism and 2) the media treats them well.
We have poor administration who cannot hide the problems in our agme with a wall of hype and the media treats us like crap anyway.

Maybe we should start putting together some teams that are without GRPs for Ireland, Scotland etc. to see what they would be like. Is this possible just for interest's sake?

 

[griff]

If you want a Parent rule you should be prepared for some major thrashing in a RLWC. I notice you have also advocated a 16 team RLWC at some point. Dimitri you are writing the recipe for a disaster of a RLWC.

Not really.

Take Russia for example. In the 2000 WC they took on about 3-4 Australians under the grandparent rule.

They lost 110-4. Maybe without the ring-ins they would have lost 120-0, but that hardly makes any difference.

The ring-ins aren't going to stop the thrashings, but without the ring-ins you make the World Cup a lot more authentic.

Scotland could have picked a lot more real Scots from their domestic and student teams. They would have been less competitive but would have been seen to be a real Scottish team.

It would be much better for the image of the RLWC if it was seen to have genuine teams, even if they were losing by slightly more points.

Sacrificing the authenticity of national teams for the sake of making them slightly more competitive was not successful in the 2000 RLWC, and we shouldn't make that mistake again.

 

[The Observer]

If you want a Parent rule you should be prepared for some major thrashing in a RLWC. I notice you have also advocated a 16 team RLWC at some point. Dimitri you are writing the recipe for a disaster of a RLWC.

Not really.

Take Russia for example. In the 2000 WC they took on about 3-4 Australians under the grandparent rule.

They lost 110-4. Maybe without the ring-ins they would have lost 120-0, but that hardly makes any difference.

Hmmm - the Russians only try was set up by a grubber kick from Redcliffe prop Bob Campbell and scored by Wests winger Matt Donovan. The best player in each game according to the book called The History of the RLWC was captain and former Roosters prop Ian Rubin.

Without the contingent of Aussie players, the Bears would have lost to a white hot Kangaroo team by 150 or maybe 200 points.

 

[roopy]

I'd be happy if the rule was you can play for a country if you went on a two week holiday there when you were in primary school (I'm thinking Bali would be a good bet to take out the RLWC under that rule).

We got a bucketing from the press for the grandparent rule - but the highest paid people in league (the RL press) give us a bucketing over everything. We should do as Union does and bend every rule in the book to get players into teams to make them competitive. If that means blond haired, blue eyed Japanese and Aboriginal Irishmen, so be it.

The difference is the press. They have let Union get away with murder because its no fun sinking the boot into the underdog, but guess what, league is starting to look like an underdog now, and Union is getting some filthy press, a bit like we have been getting for God knows how long.

Personally, I think our press are our biggest problem. They take every opportunity to sell a few papers with gutter journalism at the expence of League, and never never try to make the game look good.

The Union WC was a great example of what can be achieved with positive press. If we could convince that radio bloke who gets 2 million dollars a year from league to lay off rubbishing the game for a week or two we could put together a great WC.

 

[Jeffles]

Thanks Joker. Just my point.

The home nations are another good example of a side that's decent with a GPR and nothing without it. and these sides are ranked higher than Russia. A parent rule at this stage of RL development, mixed in with a RLWC of many sides would lead to a RLWC worse than 2000, and loook how bad that was.

 

[East Coast Tiger]

If you want a Parent rule you should be prepared for some major thrashing in a RLWC. I notice you have also advocated a 16 team RLWC at some point. Dimitri you are writing the recipe for a disaster of a RLWC.

Not really.

Take Russia for example. In the 2000 WC they took on about 3-4 Australians under the grandparent rule.

They lost 110-4. Maybe without the ring-ins they would have lost 120-0, but that hardly makes any difference.

Hmmm - the Russians only try was set up by a grubber kick from Redcliffe prop Bob Campbell and scored by Wests winger Matt Donovan. The best player in each game according to the book called The History of the RLWC was captain and former Roosters prop Ian Rubin.

Without the contingent of Aussie players, the Bears would have lost to a white hot Kangaroo team by 150 or maybe 200 points.

Ian Rubin was born in the formerSoviet Union, so is a birth rule player - no problem there. Secondly I remember in the analysis of the Australia v Russia game, more media 'experts' (hacks) bagged us for the fact that the only guy to score for Russia was an Australian called Donovan (not a typical Russian name don't you know) than for the high score.

Thanks Joker. Just my point.

The home nations are another good example of a side that's decent with a GPR and nothing without it. and these sides are ranked higher than Russia. A parent rule at this stage of RL development, mixed in with a RLWC of many sides would lead to a RLWC worse than 2000, and loook how bad that was.

We already have a parent rule. This subject is really about restricting it to a parent rule at worst ie. no GRule. Also it is my allegation is that Ireland and Scotland are nothing WITH the GRPs or close to it. Yeah they're more competitive, but what's the point in that if they are not respected as a truly representitive national team. I don't think the crowds for the ENC games in Dublin and Glasgow could have been any worse if it was a purely amateur game (what they call Amateur Home Nations ie. Ireland A v Scotland A) and these crowds were boosted by hard core English fans who made the trip. The other point I've made about these 2 nations in particular is that if you look at all the SL players who have represented them (esp. Ireland) over the last 5 years many will have qualified under the parent or birth rule and I'm sure there are plenty of pro players who haven't represented yet that could under these rules (eg. Pat Richards for Ireland). They could still put a good squad together.

Lebanon have the right idea, they've been increasing the number of Lebanese residents in their team when they could have picked more Sydney based players who would qualify under various rules including GR. This is how it should be done. Wales too gave a few of their Welsh Conference players a run, although it's a shame they weren't all young players. Sure Ireland and Scotland picked 2 resident players each but they didn't give them a game, instead they played whole squads of GRPs (with maybe 1 or 2 exceptions).

 

[bender]

You guys are kidding if you think that dropping the grandparent rule will make a more authentic world cup. Do this and the press will jump up and down about lopsided scores. The Aussie Kangaroos would beat most NRL teams by 50 points what would they do to Amateur sides. The only way Rugby Leage will become credible is to get competive international sides. SAdly, at the moment the only way to do this is throught the Grandparent rule. If there are one or two locals in these sides, they will learn something from this and occasionally some may even to go on reach the top level themselves (like Carney).

It is a little sad that the Australian team that beat Great Britain featured Luke Ricketson (Ireland), Willie Mason (Tonga), Petero Civonoceva (Fij), Anthony Minichello (Italy). All are legitimate Australians, but for the sake of international league they need to play for the smaller nations. I think possibly it is important here to differentiate between an official test match (should be 3 match series minimum with all players available regardless of the comp they play in) and regular internationals where the restrictions should be looser. Anyway back to the point, a World Cup could be very competive, if all minor nations had first pick on players. For example Andrew Johns Wales, Gordon Tallis (Tonga), Luke Davico and Anthony Minichello (Ita). With competive sides and properly promoted you would have a far better and more successful event than you could with "authentic" sides. No one would ridicule Australia v Wales, if Andrew Johns throws a cut out pass to Lee Briers to set up a Welsh win in the 90th minute. The thrashing a legitimate side receives is a different story.

To keep the others happy, maybe an emerging nations shadow tournament could be run as a double header with true authentic teams used (NO Professional players allowed)

 

[East Coast Tiger]

It's obvious this issue divides us about 50/50.

Its' Competitiveness v Legitimacy

What we need is both in the long run. So we need to figure out what can be done to achieve this.

Do we continue to give few home grown players a chance and fail to gain the respect of the media and public of those countries and others becasue the teams are not truly representitive?

OR

Do we give more legitimate players a chance and fail to gain the respect of the media and public of those countries and others becasue the teams are not competitive?

My answer is get more home grown players to a more competitive standard. That means more pro players in SL, NRL or other lower competitions. So how do we do this?

One idea is to offer clubs incentives like salary cap exemptions. Any more?

 

[dimitri]

at the moment our top 6 nations are


AUS
NZ
ENG
WALES
PNG
FRANCE


now a parent rule would not have any effect on those teams except for maybe wales


if Ireland and Scotland can pull some talent through the parent rule then I believe it is definitely a goer


id also be interested to see if many of the pacific islands would be effected


i get the feeling that a parent rule wouldnt really effect them

guys like mason, civenocieva etc etc all had parents born in the pacific islands

 

[The Observer]

Ian Rubin was born in the formerSoviet Union, so is a birth rule player - no problem there.

Actually, yes there is. In 2000, the Soviet Union did not exist. Rubin was born in Odessa in The Ukraine, which is NOT part of the Russian Federation. So on that basis he had no claim to represent Russia - it would be like Marcus Bai playing for the Kangaroos because PNG was a territory of Aus before 1975.

Furthermore, Rubin probably spent as much time in the former Soviet Union as Campbell and Donovan.

Secondly I remember in the analysis of the Australia v Russia game, more media 'experts' (hacks) bagged us

If you wanna worry about what particular quip some Ruggeroid media hack uses, then go right ahead. I doubt that hack is losing any sleep.

was an Australian called Donovan (not a typical Russian name don't you know)

I'm quite aware of it, smarty. :roll:

Get used to the fact that the hacks will bag League regardless of what the sport does.

<snipped>

Why don't you, Dimitri and griff try examining why you hold the social and cultural prejudices (i.e. to the grandparent rule) that you do?

As I've said many times elsewhere, there are other solutions and finding the right BALANCE is important. My suggestion is to install a minimum quota for Home grown players for international football - i.e. every international team should be required to include a minimum 4 in every match day squad of 17 and 1/3 of the tournament/tour/series squad.

 

[East Coast Tiger]

I'm perfectly aware of th ehistory of the Soviet Union , PNg etc. The Ukraine as part of the Soviet Union rule is very different to PNG being a protectorate of Australia.

But anyway this all beside the point.

I don't have any prejudice towards any cultural reasons why players want to play under the GR. I applaun players who have a desire to play for another nation because of their heriatge (Lee Briers etc.) I'd love to play for a nation of my heritage and I don't even qualify under the GR.

 

[griff]

Ian Rubin was born in the formerSoviet Union, so is a birth rule player - no problem there.

Actually, yes there is. In 2000, the Soviet Union did not exist. Rubin was born in Odessa in The Ukraine, which is NOT part of the Russian Federation. So on that basis he had no claim to represent Russia - it would be like Marcus Bai playing for the Kangaroos because PNG was a territory of Aus before 1975.

Furthermore, Rubin probably spent as much time in the former Soviet Union as Campbell and Donovan.

Ian Rubin was born in the former Soviet Union and lived there until he was 4, but I don't believe Campbell of Donovan have ever been to Russia, Ukraine, or any other former Soviet republic.

And although he was born in the Ukraine, I believe it was of Russian parents. Therefore he qualified for Russia through his parents rather than grandparents or place of birth.

Secondly I remember in the analysis of the Australia v Russia game, more media 'experts' (hacks) bagged us

If you wanna worry about what particular quip some Ruggeroid media hack uses, then go right ahead. I doubt that hack is losing any sleep.

was an Australian called Donovan (not a typical Russian name don't you know)

I'm quite aware of it, smarty. :roll:

Get used to the fact that the hacks will bag League regardless of what the sport does.

This "they are all against us" attitude is pretty simplistic.

Rugby League will certainly get bagged if there are reasons for it, and rightly so. We do it ourselves often enough.

I think two Australians with tenuous links to Russia suddenly playing in the World Cup deserves to be bagged.

The inclusion of the Australians in a Russian side did tremendous damage to the perception of authenticity of the World Cup.

And what good did it do? Not much, since they got thrashed anyway. It's a matter of opinion, but I don't think they would have been beaten by much more than 110-4 without the ring-ins. Even if it was 140-0, that isn't really much worse from a competitive point of view than 110-4.

<snipped>

Why don't you, Dimitri and griff try examining why you hold the social and cultural prejudices (i.e. to the grandparent rule) that you do?

Ah, that old chestnut, label the opposition as prejudiced.

My argument is nothing to do with prejudice and all about preserving the authenticity of the World Cup.

I'm not completely opposed to the grandparent rule, but when players, solely for the World Cup, play for countries they have never been to and probably never will, and in doing that make the World Cup look like a joke, then I have a problem with it.

At one end of the scale, you could have a World Cup full of NRL players, and it would be pretty competitive. But it would have zero legitimacy.

As East Coast Tiger said, it is about the right balance between competitiveness and legitimacy. Even with the ring-ins, Russia etc are not competitive. Since you don't have competitiveness, you need to have legitimacy.

Russia could have easily had a 100% Russian squad drawn from their domestic competition. But they picked a few players from Australia to make their squad slightly more competitive. In doing that, they completely sacrificed their legitimacy.

As the Rugby Union World Cup showed, to have a successful tournament the perception of legitimacy is much more important than being competitive.

There is also the argument of hard-working Rugby League players not being able to represent their country due to places being taken by ring-ins.

As I've said many times elsewhere, there are other solutions and finding the right BALANCE is important. My suggestion is to install a minimum quota for Home grown players for international football - i.e. every international team should be required to include a minimum 4 in every match day squad of 17 and 1/3 of the tournament/tour/series squad.

Funny how we come opposite sides of the argument to a similar conclusion. I pretty much agree with this sort of concept.

As I said before, I'm not sure whether it should be an enforced quota system, or just each country doing the right thing for its own circumstances. I don't really like the idea of having different classes of players within the one squad.

But I suppose it would have to be enforced, as countries would probably be shortsighted and just pick the strongest available squad even if it was completely ring-ins.

Rather than have a grandparent rule, I think eligibility should be based on claims to nationality under that country's nationality laws. So the eligibilty rules should be something like:

1) a citizen of that country or eligible to become one; or,
2) resident in that country for 3 years; or,
3) have represented that country previously in international sport; or,
4) have a parent who represented that country in international sport.

 

[yankeeboy]

I think that the major problem is not the grandparent rule, but it's use in combination with nation hopping. For example, Luke Ricketson represented Ireland in the 2000 WC, and then, only a year or two later, was representing the Kangaroos, against Britain and Ireland, who he in theory should have represented. I think that their should be a mandatory waiting period of 3 or so years before a player can play for a new nation. The date would start at the last international played for another nation, and he would have to undergo 3 years of no internationals to represent another country.

 

[yakstorm]

I think that the major problem is not the grandparent rule, but it's use in combination with nation hopping.

Yankeeboy has pretty much struck the nail on the head with all of this. Lets face it, there are cases in Union, Cricket and Soccer where people further back from Grandparent rule have represented nations, but even when the issue is raised, people just brush it off simply cause they feel the individual has done his or her part for their nation.

Lets face it, whilst the Welsh, Scottish, Irish, Russians and even Australians will get behind players if they represent some of the ideals of those nations, and play their hearts out whenever they are on the field.

Its all about pride in the jersey, none of this crap about whether or not a player is their cause they were born there or cause of parent rule and grand parent rule, the end of the day fans, and media of those nations want people committed to that nation and will put their bodies on the line.

Now I suppose some of you will point to the 2000 RLWC and say, "Why didn't they get behind the players in the 2000 World Cup? Clearly it was cause of the low number of 'local' players"

That does hold a point, but that is only cause no one knew about these players beforehand in those nations, and secondly, no one expected them to stay loyal to those nations. Also in many cases, there were alot of players who represented other nations before that tournament ie. Chris Joynt (England and Ireland).

Now some people will say that you wont get players for these 'weaker' nations if players are forced to stick to them for life, but I would beg to differ. Many players in the NRL and ESL will never make Australia, Great Britain&Ireland and New Zealand, they will know this, and if they want to play international Rugby League, they will agree to commit.

Now also you will need to then make sure that those weaker nations have a regular international structure (at least 2 matches a year) so people can acctually learn who the hell so and so is, and which country they represent.

Add a bit of marketing twist to it, ie highlight the connections to that country strongly and anything that doesn't connect them, sorta leave that hidden, and those teams will develop their own respect.

In this you will also need the League nations to agree to a code of conduct in terms of selecting players as well. Good luck forming a contract which players which will not challenge eventually, instead if you make the nations agree to a protect mine, protect yours agreement, where they as such trade off players and agree not to touch ones others have already picked and so on, it will work the best.

 

[In-goal]

Once again Yakstorm you talk more sence than most could comprehend, RL needs as many of the modern day pros playing internationals as is possible to keep the game going forward.