European farce has forced Samoa to play waiting game
WE’VE already had more false starts than an Olympic 100m final and there will now be a further delay before we get a definitive decision on the World Cup fate of Romania, Spain and indeed Belgium.
A week on Thursday seems to be the earliest date but don’t hold your breath. Mr Quinlan QC and his committee are clearly finding it tough going making sense of the World Rugby eligibility regulations.
Just a quick reminder of what is at stake. Who are Europe 1 and therefore qualify for RWC219 and indeed will play the opening game against Japan? And who are the runners up in the recent European qualifying tournament? We need a decision ASAP because that team must play Portugal and then Samoa before potentially qualifying for the repechage tournament in France in November. Stage one is to determine a considerable number of eligibility cases – some seemingly straight forward, others very contentious – and then rule whether any offences uncovered disqualify the teams from the World Cup process. If they do we could have the situation of Russia being installed as Europe 1 and a miserably poor – on last season’s form – Germany going into the play-offs which frankly would bring the World Cup into further disrepute.
If Quinlan doesn’t disqualify Spain, World Rugby have already ruled that the Spaniards will be allowed to replay their controversial match against Belgium, considered unsound because of the mystifying and unacceptable appointment of Romanian officials and their, er, extremely poor performance on the day. We await news on what disciplinary measures will be taken in this regard.
If Spain were to win that they would qualify automatically as Europe 1; if they lost they will progress to the play-off game against Portugal and then, depending on result, a further play-off game against Samoa.
Highly paid QCs don’t naturally attract our sympathy but Mr Quinlan has mine. He is between a rock and hard place here. He must make haste slowly but he is also trying to square the circle. Innocent parties are already suffering.
Portugal, who have a decent team and were on a roll after winning the REC2 Championship, have had to sit around twiddling their thumbs waiting to know their opponents. Already one scheduled date has passed. These are amateur players who have to make leave arrangements well in advance.
Meanwhile Samoa – having failed to qualify via the Pacific group – had obviously targetted their double header play-off against Europe 2 which was due to be held in June in the middle of the Test window which ensured they could call on all their far flung players, especially those in France.
But now that double header has been put back to July when employers like to see their players either resting from international endeavours or beginning their pre-season. Technically under regulation 9 they must still release players for international duty but some lesser names might be disinclined to brandish the regulations book and risk further gainful employment.
Samoa’s plight was immediately recognised by fellow Pacific islander, Fiji’s Nemani Nadolo, who tweeted his support: “What a JOKE!! This just makes it messy for the Samoa players and their pro clubs overseas! July/August is an important time for prepping with the new season. It’s tough as it is trying to convince our clubs to go play for our countries!”
Mr Quinlan is in for a rough ride whatever his call. If he acknowledges ineligible players appearing for Romania and Spain – and indeed Belgium – but allows them to remain in the World Cup process fingers will immediately point to Tahiti who were chucked out of the tournament earlier this year for fielding ineligible players, not to mention Russia being chucked out of the 2003 repechage tournament for just such an offence.
Equally if a couple of Spain’s players who appeared for France U20 – in the case of Mathieu Belie ten years ago – are deemed ineligible it will rightly result in accusations of gross hypocrisy and disclination over the institutional preference shown to T1 nations who seemingly cherry pick U20 players from around the world at will.
Some T1 teams also cynically buy up desired players and, using central funds, install them with a team to see out their three-year residency period.
The system is rotten from top to bottom and seemingly rigged to protect and promote the privileged cash rich T1 nations.
Additionally World Rugby ruled in 2014 that U20 was junior rugby and henceforth should never be used as a capture team. Come decision time the game at large won’t be that interested in the small print of the shockingly drafted regulations, all they will want to see is former U20 players the world over – teenagers – be treated the same.
If they don’t it will cause irreparable damage to the socalled T2 nations who already face an almost impossible task and Rugby XVs will not grow into the properly global sport that World Rugby insist it can be.
The stakes are high. Which is why this decision is taking so long.