NZR boss hits out at ‘colonial’ attitudes

New Zealand Rugby’s chairman just managed to stop himself calling what he claims is poor treatment of the Pacific Island rugby nations as colonialism.

Brent Impey savaged World Rugby and says the organisation and its voting members have a lot to answer for.

World Rugby’s treatment of the Island nations is extremely disappointing, Impey told Radio New Zealand. He accused countries such as Scotland, Ireland, Wales and England of voting on rules to suit themselves.

Impey says eligibility rules need to be relaxed to help increase the competitiveness and grow rugby in the Pacific. He has also accused northern hemisphere clubs of pressuring Pasifika players to not make themselves available for international duties.

Impey told Radio New Zealand that his organisation has lobbied hard for relaxed eligibility changes for the Pacific and tier 2 nations but has been unable to get the necessary votes in support of the move.

‘‘You can point the finger straight at the likes of Scotland, Ireland, Wales, England – these countries who, you look at them and you look at their teams and what they have done in terms of rules that suit themselves,’’ Impey said.

‘‘I mean I’m very tempted, I probably won’t go quite this far but I’m very tempted to say it’s virtually colonialism,’’ he said.

Impey cited the likes of Charles Piutau who played the last of his 17 tests for the All Blacks at just 23 in 2015 and Steven Luatua who quit New Zealand rugby in 2017, aged 25, after 15 tests.

‘‘I believe there should be eligibility rules which allow players who’ve played for tier 1 countries such as the All Blacks to go back after say, a year and play for their countries of origin,’’ he said.

Under Impey’s desired changes, Piutau could have played for Tonga and Luatua could have represented Samoa at this year’s World Cup. Eligibility wasn’t the only area where Impey feels Pacific nations have been let down.

‘‘There has been a lot of incidents where Pacifika players who have got their family responsibilities have made themselves curiously unavailable for their national teams because of pressure put on by clubs in Europe. ‘‘I believe that you cannot put any blame on that on the Pasifika players themselves because they’ve got to feed their families.

‘‘But it just shows World Rugby has been really poor in addressing those issues,’’ Impey told Radio New Zealand.

Impey said he took zero satisfaction from the All Blacks’ 92-7 victory over Tonga in Hamilton last month because it simply showed the growing gap between tier 1 and 2 nations.

He said if there are no changes to the eligibility rules, in 20 years time at the 2039 World Cup, the same eight to 10 teams that have been in contention for the 2019 version will be fighting out that World Cup too. Brent Impey on attitudes to Pasifika players

Eddie Jones versus Michael Cheika is being billed as ‘‘the battle of the big mouths’’ with the coaching rivalry set to dominate the lead-in to the juicy Rugby World Cup quarterfinal between England and Australia.

They square off on Saturday (8.15pm NZT) but already the testy relationship between the two mouthy coaches is hitting the headlines in the UK.

described them as the ‘‘Rugby World Cup’s gobbiest coaches’’ with their personal history going back to their playing days at Sydney’s Randwick club and for New South Wales.

noted that Cheika didn’t want to ‘‘get into an old boys’ spat . . . but could he resist?’’

They then ran a few gems from the highly opinionated Cheika that covered Jones bringing in NRL great Ricky Stuart for advice and also his typhoon predictions.

There was also a cutting line when Cheika was asked whether getting a win over England would be a special career

‘‘World Rugby has been really poor in addressing those issues.’’

moment. Cheika insisted he did not see it like that. You ‘‘cherish’’ the good moments, he said. ‘‘You are not looking to make a movie or write a book,’’