The "grandparent rule" for international teams

[screeny]

Good point jvujosevic. How difficult can it be for the RLEF to insist on every player turning up with some form of ID of either themselves or their parents or GPs just to prove they're eligible.

Another thing that costs the game's adminsitrators not one penny but smacks of good, serious governance.

 

[Copa]

Passports aren't the be all and end all.... if the grandparent rule is used, the player may not be a citizen, or even permanent resident, of the country they are playing for. Showing their passport would be useless in this situation.

 

[bazza]

On the topic of the original post - teams should be only allowed into the qualifiers if they have a domestic competition that has been running for some time (at least 2 full seasons)
What countries can claim this?

1. Australia
2. New Zealand
3. England
4. Ireland
5. Scotland
6. Wales
7. France
8. PNG
9. Tonga
10. Fiji
11. USA
12. Russia
13. Serbia
14. Lebanon
15. Cook Islands

Countries that definitely wouldn't meet that requirement at this stage: Greece, Italy, Malta, Singapore, West Indies

Countries I am not sure on: Holland, South Africa, Morocco, Argentina, Samoa

 

[Copa]

After a bit more thought.... to have the Serbs ask for passports will not serve the purpose they think it will.

If someone qualifies for a team via their grandmother it would require quite few passports, birth certificates, marriage certificates (to prove name changes) etc etc to link the player back to the grandmother's country. Passports are hard, but not impossible, to forge.... old style birth certificates are more easily forged...the Serbs would require a "blank" passport for various countries for comparison, they would also require rudimentary document fraud training to recognise genuine birth and marriage certificates from various countries etc etc... it's all just absurd.

This sort of thing should be centralised so that expertise can be developed at proving a player's eligibility via the "grand parent" rule. The eligibility findings of these decision makers should be trusted by the various RL governing bodies...

Expertise should be developed and strong policies be put in place (prbably already like this) to maintain high levels of integrity in the process and less situations where some governing bodies are wanting the opposition players to show their passports before a game. Various governing bodies should be educated on the process also to reduce suspicion and increase trust.

 

[screeny]

Mate, if you want to delve into the realms of fraudulent documents then it would be next to impossible for any federation to cotton on. Even Fifa would have trouble, there best defence would be the popularity of football resulting in a 'friend' or acquaintance of the fraudster outing him in the press.

RL does not suffer from such a global appeal, though, or the sophistication to check up on fraudulent documents.

 

[hgfds]

The gp rule is not going to aid,serbia,japan,georgia,usa or russia much so they are nations that should be against it,with rl based in ozuk,it is certainly going to aid the home nations and knock the first 5 out of the wc,wales and ireland should be able to cope better without it now but scotland would find it difficult to qualify.serbia surely has to find a way to use their overseas players if they want to win against,georgia,usa,russia,holland germany etc

 

[Evil Homer]

Serbia are doing the best thing for their country though and by not playing overseas players are helping the game far more.It's a shame that they are getting punished for it.I'm much more satisfied with Serbia than say Italy because these are real Serbians being rewarded for playing the game,not being kicked out of their national team by average Aussies.

 

[League Freak™]

On the topic of the original post - teams should be only allowed into the qualifiers if they have a domestic competition that has been running for some time (at least 2 full seasons)
What countries can claim this?

1. Australia
2. New Zealand
3. England
4. Ireland
5. Scotland
6. Wales
7. France
8. PNG
9. Tonga
10. Fiji
11. USA
12. Russia
13. Serbia
14. Lebanon
15. Cook Islands

Countries that definitely wouldn't meet that requirement at this stage: Greece, Italy, Malta, Singapore, West Indies

Countries I am not sure on: Holland, South Africa, Morocco, Argentina, Samoa

I agree 100%.


Im sick and tried of teams being created out of thin air.

 

[screeny]

Serbia are doing the best thing for their country though and by not playing overseas players are helping the game far more.It's a shame that they are getting punished for it.I'm much more satisfied with Serbia than say Italy because these are real Serbians being rewarded for playing the game,not being kicked out of their national team by average Aussies.

Totally disagree. Surely fielding 4-5 Australian or British Serb pros would be much better for the game in Serbia. The int'l players who live in Serbia would enjoy themselves more, they would learn more, they would be more inspired by the higher level of play, the outside interest in their nation and the possibility of achieveing better results.

They game fellows but they know they're going to lose virtually every match.

And they're not fooling anyone if they say 'we only play Serbs from Serbia for better development' - if a few NSWRL players called '-vic' turned up in Belgrade they'd jump at the chanc of playing them.

The RLEF/RLIF can put a quota in place though. 50% or 75% or whatever of a tournament squad must play RL in the local domestic comp and live in the country, the rest can be GP rulers. How difficult is it to instigate? It costs nothing and it means we have guidelines from which to operate.

 

[griff]

I don't like a quota system because it means there are two sorts of players in the one team, but this is the only way to enhance the perception of legitimacy.

Teams should only be allowed to enter the qualification process if they have at least 4 clubs playing regularly in that country. If there is a chance of RLWC qualification (and the share of the revenue that goes along with that) this would provide an incentive for those countries like Italy and Malta to do some work in that country and set up a domestic comp. This is also a good reason for a larger RLWC; minor nations having a realistic chance of making it provides an incentive to develop their domestic comps.

 

[Evil Homer]

It's an international team FFS,it shouldn't need a quota on overseas players!If say an Aussie played in the tri-nations for Britain I and many other fans would be up in arms.It benefiets the game far more to have real local players playing.

I agree with the second paragraph of the above post fully though.

 

[sunny]

the grandparent rule is something so stupid only a rugby league administrator could come up with it. How about a rule that says that to play for a country, YOU, not your parents, grandparents or great grandparents, YOU YOURSELF actually need to be from that country.

Sorry, that'd make sense. I apologise profusely.

 

[screeny]

Sunny, in defence of stupid RL administrators - I agree, they deserve everything they get - most other major sport use the GP ruling. The IOC is one and their eligibility rules are the dodgiest in the world, with nations basically selling passports to various athletes.

 

[sunny]

Just because they do it doesn't mean rugby league should do it too.

 

[screeny]

true, but it's a common sporting practice around the world. At least RL should police it and limit players to one country, and limit the number of GPs per squad, in my opinion.

 

[sunny]

there should be f**k all grandparent players per squad. You play for that country means you actually come from there, period.

 

[Der Kaiser]

I was sadly born in England but my fathers and most his family are German.I was never really accepted by most people growing up as a local.I would NEVER play or even support an English or British team in any sport and will always follow germany first.i have a soft spot for Australia and love to see them beat the Brits.I would rather die than play for any English team.I may not be born in Germany but I am strongly proud of my roots and doubt I am alone.


What is wrong is when players play for two nations.Either you are fully commited or not.For me a player cheapens a national jersey by playing for both.Germany have a German Development team.Its not a national side as such as we dont have the number of players to ful fill that yet but we do try and aim to play German born players first , followed by Parent rule players then we may like now use an American, Zimbabwean, Scot, English guy-all with no experience of League to make the side up.Its not great but feel by calling it a development side people know what they are getting.

 

[Sun_Down]

Players should not represent a country they are not passionate about.

Otherwise there is no point...