FIFA eligibility laws need some changes

 
dasilva Roar Guru

By dasilva, 30 Mar 2009 dasilva is a Roar Guru

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Australia is now facing various recent issues associated with FIFA eligibility laws. On one hand we have players like Bradden Inman and Rhys Williams who are set to represent Scotland and Wales respectively due to nationality of their parents.

On the other hand we have players like Kofi Danning who has lived in this country for 10 years are set to be forbidden to represent Young Socceroos (pending appeal from FFA) as he hasn’t lived in this country for 5 years after the age of 18 (he is only 17 years old).

Other Australian players like John Cisak and Julius Davies may also be kept out of the loop for this reason. A lot of these players migrated to Australia as refugees and are now forbidden to represent Australia.

From Article 17 of FIFA Statute:
Any Player who to assume a new nationality and who has not played international football shall be eligible to play for the new representative team only if he fulfills one of the following conditions:
(a) He was born on the territory of the relevant Association;
(b) His biological mother or biological father was born on the territory of the relevant Association;
(c) His grandmother or grandfather was born on the territory of the relevant Association;
(d) He has lived continuously for at least five years after reaching the age of 18 on the territory of the relevant Association.

Article 17 (d) was added to FIFA Statute to address this issue of Qatar Football Association policy of scouting 10 years old from South America and Africa and bringing them over to Qatar to represent their national team.

I praise FIFA to attempt to stop this practice; I have to question whether this is the right way to go about it. Firstly, all this means is that it will take longer for the South American and African born players to represent Qatar.

I don’t believe this will stop the practice and the better way is to regulate transfer of players to clubs and to fine association for encouraging this practice.

Secondly, what right does FIFA has in telling those players who have lived in Qatar for 5 years that they aren’t Qatari in nationality and can’t represent their country.

I agree in punishing the association but you shouldn’t punish the players that were being poached as they are innocent in this. Australia is now caught in this crossfire due to the actions of the QFA. 5 years over the age of 18 to represent a country is overkill and should be change back to a simple 5 years of residence.

Now I will argue that Article 17 (b) and (c) should be removed from FIFA statute. We can get on our high horses and criticise the likes of Bradden Inman and Joe Simunic but in the end their decision was legal and they are taking advantage of the laws of the game.

However I think it’s a terrible rule.

The International Cricket Council agrees and after the 1996 World Cup where the UAE team was filled with mostly Indians who weren’t residence of UAE and only had 2 locally born players in the squad, the ICC change the laws saying you could only play for the country of birth or residence for the last 5 years which stop the practice of playing for the country of your parents. FIFA would do well to adopt that policy.

The reason why I dislike the concept of playing for the nation of your parents is that I believe what’s more important is where you grew up, which countries raise you, which countries you are contributing to society and which society that contributed to your welfare.

People shouldn’t be putting ethnicity or even culture to the scenario. My justification for this will get in to issues beyond sport.

I reject the notion that people having “insert race blood” running through their veins and that people should be loyal to their ethnicity. I always thought in modern society the importance of ethnicity should be de-emphasised.

What’s to be proud of the fact that your gene is less then 0.01% different to Anglo-Australians that cause you to have different skin tone. We also don’t celebrate having different blood type (ABO system) which is the real difference between the bloods running through your veins.

Some people feel that they have more in common with the culture of their parents then they do with the culture of mainstream society.

I have no problem with that as Australia along with other countries is a multicultural society as well as a liberal society.

To be Australian is to be yourself and follow your own path whether that is more inline with the culture of heritage it doesn’t matter. The only thing that does matter is that whatever you do or what ever you behave you do it as an Australians.

If you speak Italian, Chinese, Vietnamese at home, go to Buddhist temple, Muslim mosque, eat whatever food your culture has, and have more conservative values, all of that is equally Australian as watching cricket, having a BBQ etc.

Australia is a country that mostly (there are few nationalist exceptions) encourages people to stay true to their culture. If people then turn their backs on Australia and represent the country of their parents then it’s taking advantage of that generosity.

Why should Australia be a multicultural country if the children grow up more loyal to the country of parent’s origin then loyal to Australia?

It defeats the whole purpose of multiculturalism and give fuels to ultra-nationalist. I believe allowing people to represent the country of parents birth undermines the principle of multiculturalism in many countries as well as encourage unnecessary divisions in society and hence it is a bad rule.

If FIFA ends up copying ICC eligibility rules, someone like Mark Bresciano would be eligible for Italy and Australia, Jason Culina would be eligible for Australia and Netherlands and Joe Simunic would be eligible for Australia and Germany but they wouldn’t be allowed to represent Croatia which I believe is fair enough.

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