What comes to mind after reading this is the hours of time I spent responding to posts from people criticizing the idea of Argentina entering the Tri Nations. The UAR needs to get its house in order... the UAR needs to be professional... etc. These comments were wide spread and yet everytime I responded by pointing out that Australia had absolutely no professional set up at home or any domestic championship whatsoever the calls for Argentina to have a domestic pro comp were not weakend. Australia still has nothing domestic yet Argentina has a National Provincial Championship and very well working club competitions which are city and regional based.
Argentina got good from France and to a lesser extent England, Scotland, Italy and Ireland contracting players and giving them regular game time in professional leagues. The week-in, week-out routine produced the Bronze Medal winning side. The same system is largely responsible for Fiji toppling Wales in 2007 and indeed for Georgia coming from nothing to a genuine tier two side knocking on tier one.
All country´s have their own history. All are different and different rugby systems apply to different places. The Top 14 is perfect for France. Not so for Wales. Super Rugby is perfect for Australia. Not so for New Zealand (as it has meant the national competition has been significantly downgraded). It would be great for Georgia to have improved domestic infrastructure but it seems to be clear that the players in France are the ones developing the most. Georgia´s domestic structure, in my view, is on the right track and will take a long time to appraoch that of the 6 Nations but could rival Scotland and Italy´s two premier level pro team structure by the end of the decade.
You won't get much argument from me on most of what you say here, although I have always felt that Argentina should ultimately try to get their own professional (or at least semi-professional) rugby competition, I don't think that the lack of one should ever have been a bar to them joining the tri-nations. Like Italy with the 6N, they have been allowed in too late. Italy should have been in when they were at their best; in 1997 when they beat France, Ireland and Scotland in the same 12 month period. Same with Argentina, they should at least have been in as early as 2007 when it was apparent that they were fast becoming one of the top sides in the world. In early October of that year, the top four IRB Ranked sides were New Zealand, Australia, South Africa and Argentina, in that order.
Australia use Super Rugby as their professional domestic competition, so that after sixteen years of Super Rugby, they still do not have anything comparable with the NZ's ITM Cup or SA's Currie Cup. This is possibly a reason why their referees are generally crap, as they jump straight from the largely amateur rugby of the Shute Shield and the Hospital Cup in Sydney and Brisbane respectively, into the cauldron of Super Rugby, where they are in over their heads and found wanting. Its one of the reasons why Aussie referees have been encouraged to lift their standards by being invited to control ITM Cup games in the past couple of years.
Argentina has a good semi professional championship now, and it looks like their
"Campeonato Argentino de Mayores" (Senior Argentine Championship) in 2012 will include teams from Chile and Uruguay for the first time. Of course it should not be forgotten that many of their top domestic players played in South Africa's Vodacom Cup in 2011, and they won it!!
I strongly feel for the long term development of a country investing in their own league, if it is possible, is the best long term strategy. Exactly what Argentina are doing right now. And Georgia and Russia. I have read rumours that the U.S. and Canada are doing the exact same thing, though I have heard them before.
The old expression of Rome wasn't built in a day springs to mind. Start with the establishment of a professional league, get involved in a cross boarder competition, have the international team involved in a meaningful competition and then rate yourself against the Southern Hemisphere every Autumn.
The above idea of sending all good players overseas would kill any progression of a country that has potential to play tier one rugby.
This I agree with too. Its hard to pull local crowds into local games, when all your best players are 12,000 miles away playing for teams that mean nothing to them. Its why we don't pick All Blacks from New Zealanders playing in Europe. If we did, the fear is that would simply open the flood gates for players chasing the â'¬, and kill the domestic game in NZ.
Rather we look at it from the perspective that every time a player heads for, say, England, and takes a spot in an Aviva Premiership side, it closes the door on a young England player, and opens the door for a young New Zealand player to step up into the big time.
and will play there for a year. that should tell the story. you know guys these players are not Just made out of thin air i think most people underestimate how serious the rugby business is in Georgia. 
