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Country of Birth International XVs

these percentages don't tell half the story.
Always the most frustrating part of straight up figures like this. People latch onto them without much thought and then you get troglodytes who will argue the players your talking about should just play for countries they were born in despite zero connection there.

Players like Shields are a problem and we should curtail that level of nonsense but we shouldn't be consigning Underhill to being America's only good player just to circumstances of where he was born.
 
The tweet more or less reads "Argentina and SA don't attract their immigrant populations to rugby and aren't near as attractive places to live as Western Europe, NZ or Oz".

I'd be very surprised if less than 1 in 5 UK and Irish citizens were born abroad.

I'm very worried about Pichot being so high up in WR, he seems very anti-European rugby even though it provided him with his livelihood.
 
The tweet more or less reads "Argentina and SA don't attract their immigrant populations to rugby and aren't near as attractive places to live as Western Europe, NZ or Oz".

I'd be very surprised if less than 1 in 5 UK and Irish citizens were born abroad.

I'm very worried about Pichot being so high up in WR, he seems very anti-European rugby even though it provided him with his livelihood.

I'm pretty sure if Argentina had been granted entry to what would have been the 7N his stance maybe a little different too.

Either way, the moment anyone is elected to an office that presides over international interests rather than national ones... they need to at least try to be objective and unbiased. Pichot seems like he's fighting a revolution for his own ideals not those of rugby. You'd like to think it will result in his supporter base within World Rugby withdrawing somewhat.
 
Can someone enlighten me on this part of the numbers,

The SA 0% is interesting is it a post-apartheid thing? Because there have been plenty of cases of us having athletes that were born in SA but most cases involve emigration from UK of a parent or grandparent and usually return. That my own family history but that goes back 60+ years now. I'm just surprised it hasn't happened that someone hasn't been born here then moved out.

I guess if you are European you tend to have kids and you have in your home country you rarely intend to move but I know of it happening growing up.

Or is it just a SA eligibility thing enforced by their goverment? Who have stricter rules on citizenship than most countries but not so much it that it would preclude foreign born people claiming it.
 
Can someone enlighten me on this part of the numbers,

The SA 0% is interesting is it a post-apartheid thing? Because there have been plenty of cases of us having athletes that were born in SA but most cases involve emigration from UK of a parent or grandparent and usually return. That my own family history but that goes back 60+ years now. I'm just surprised it hasn't happened that someone hasn't been born here then moved out.

I guess if you are European you tend to have kids and you have in your home country you rarely intend to move but I know of it happening growing up.

Or is it just a SA eligibility thing enforced by their goverment? Who have stricter rules on citizenship than most countries but not so much it that it would preclude foreign born people claiming it.

Watch the video I posted earlier in the thread, I'm sure he got the figures from that... if so, they are basically 'where a person was born' and nothing else. Not residence, heritage or anything other that if someone was born in a particular nation even if it was because your folks were on vacation at the time.
 
Watch the video I posted earlier in the thread, I'm sure he got the figures from that... if so, they are basically 'where a person was born' and nothing else. Not residence, heritage or anything other that if someone was born in a particular nation even if it was because your folks were on vacation at the time.

... and with the state of SA (as a country not a rugby team) of late, NO ONE is moving there... quite the opposite.
 
The two most obvious improvements that can be mad to me is the removal of the grandparent qualification, make it parents at the maximum and an increase in residence period (which has already happened).
 
The two most obvious improvements that can be mad to me is the removal of the grandparent qualification, make it parents at the maximum and an increase in residence period (which has already happened).
I don't think the grandparents rule can be legally changed, if I moved to America tomorrow and never came back my grandkids would still be entitled to Irish citizenship even if they never set foot here. I'm no expert but I'd say it's pretty hard for any kind of decent legal argument to stand up saying you can then deny them the opportunity to then play for the country where they've an entitlement to citizenship.


Digressing, Heaslip and similar examples are what makes this insistence on country of birth ridiculous, his IRISH parents were serving in Lebanon with the UN when he was born, he was born on Israel because there weren't appropriate facilities in Lebanon, he's lived in IRELAND more or less his entire life, he came up through the IRISH rugby system, he captained an IRISH rugby team (Leinster but he was genuine Ireland captain as well), he's got an IRISH accent, I could go on. From what can anyone reasanobly come out with the idea that he should play rugby for Israel?
 
Always the most frustrating part of straight up figures like this. People latch onto them without much thought and then you get troglodytes who will argue the players your talking about should just play for countries they were born in despite zero connection there.

Players like Shields are a problem and we should curtail that level of nonsense but we shouldn't be consigning Underhill to being America's only good player just to circumstances of where he was born.

Hold on now, we'd also have tommy Seymour.

I don't get the shields hate... his parents were English.
 
Hold on now, we'd also have tommy Seymour.

I don't get the shields hate... his parents were English.

I think it's the way he was catapulted into the squad having previously trained with the ABs? But yeah, he's got as much of a right to play for England as anyone else.
 
I don't get the shields hate... his parents were English.
I think you need to live in a country for a significant amount of time to really claim to be from there and represent them. Shields' parents might be English but hes a Kiwi through and through.
 
Hold on now, we'd also have tommy Seymour.

I don't get the shields hate... his parents were English.
I think the 'poachiness' feel for Shields is based on his birthplace was NZ, and he spent all age grades and professional career being developed in NZ.
Plus, I think his parents were both English born but moved to NZ at a very young age. Which adds to the poachiness level in some people's eyes.
 
I think the 'poachiness' feel for Shields is based on his birthplace was NZ, and he spent all age grades and professional career being developed in NZ.
Plus, I think his parents were both English born but moved to NZ at a very young age. Which adds to the poachiness level in some people's eyes.

So what about Gareth Anscombe, who was brought to Wales with the intention of him playing almost immediately for the national team, given how his mother is from Cardiff? That said, pure residency/project players like CJ Stander, WP Nel and Hadleigh Parkes I am against. Develop your own players for goodness sake.
 
I don't think the grandparents rule can be legally changed, if I moved to America tomorrow and never came back my grandkids would still be entitled to Irish citizenship even if they never set foot here. I'm no expert but I'd say it's pretty hard for any kind of decent legal argument to stand up saying you can then deny them the opportunity to then play for the country where they've an entitlement to citizenship.


Digressing, Heaslip and similar examples are what makes this insistence on country of birth ridiculous, his IRISH parents were serving in Lebanon with the UN when he was born, he was born on Israel because there weren't appropriate facilities in Lebanon, he's lived in IRELAND more or less his entire life, he came up through the IRISH rugby system, he captained an IRISH rugby team (Leinster but he was genuine Ireland captain as well), he's got an IRISH accent, I could go on. From what can anyone reasanobly come out with the idea that he should play rugby for Israel?

He could join a kibbutz and marry Bar Refaeli?:) Anyway, more seriously, I agree with what Pichot says up to a point - the PIs in particular have been severely hindered by having so many players poached - but there are ways to feel genuinely connected to a country other than birth: citizenship, recent ancestry, residency.
 
Also, re Argentina specifically, it may be very nativist nowadays, but in its early days it was mostly full of British and Irish immigrants. (This still persists with some other teams like Hong Kong and the UAE).
 
I do love how we're happy to take certain rights away from a player. Complaining about Shields does make sense but there is absolutely no way of stopping it. It's similar for players on the 3/5 yr rule, mostly it's guys who'll be valued more highly and who'll receive a higher quality of life elsewhere leaving, it's an economic decision with international rugby being a potential perk.
 
He could join a kibbutz and marry Bar Refaeli?:) Anyway, more seriously, I agree with what Pichot says up to a point - the PIs in particular have been severely hindered by having so many players poached - but there are ways to feel genuinely connected to a country other than birth: citizenship, recent ancestry, residency.

What? Look at the birthplaces of players on New Zealand and the other PIs, and then you'll see who's actually doing the "poaching".
 
I'd remove parentage is possible
I do love how we're happy to take certain rights away from a player. Complaining about Shields does make sense but there is absolutely no way of stopping it. It's similar for players on the 3/5 yr rule, mostly it's guys who'll be valued more highly and who'll receive a higher quality of life elsewhere leaving, it's an economic decision with international rugby being a potential perk.
I agree I'd change the rules to just residency if I could but I also no there's no way to stop it.
 

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