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The story of Jerry Yanuyanutawa’s plight in potentially playing for Fiji in the World Cup has come to light from Rugby Heaven, with the issue likely to bring a club vs country debate into Australia Rugby Union headquaters.
The article reads: “The problem for Yanuyanutawa is that if he was to play for Fiji, he would forfeit the final year of his Brumbies contract because he will not meet the criteria of being eligible for the Wallabies.
“Even if Yanuyanutawa wanted to answer the plea of Fiji … Brumbies chief executive Andrew Fagan said the club could prevent him from doing so.”
I think Fagan might find himself a bit mistaken. Jerry Yanuyanutawa dosnt have to ask anyone to play for a country he is qualified for.
In fact, the IRB can place sanctions on any club prohibiting a player from playing for their country (although unfortunately this hardly ever happens).
Obviously, if Yanuyanutawa plays for Fiji, it may mean the Brumbies have more that one foreign qualified player which the ARU prohibits. It may also breach his contract. So the Brumbies could sack him.
But they cannot prevent him from playing to Fiji and he does not need to ask “permission”.
Bearing in mind that Yanuyanutawa has only played a handful of games for the Brumbies, and is not likely to ever feature in the Wallabies, I dont think he should be prevented from representing Fiji if he wishes to.
This raises the issue of the current foreign player quotas in Aussie Super Rugby sides. Apart from Melbourne who have a dispensation, sides can have one foreign qualified player, and one player not currently qualified but who can qualify for Australia in the future through residency.
While I believe the addition of Melbourne is good long term for Aussie rugby, I think this year has shown a bit of a lack of depth in our rugby.
Maybe we should allow one foriegn qualified player and an additional two Tier-2 country qualified players (Fiji, Japan, Tonga, Samoa, Argentina etc) per team.
With 5 Aussie Super sides, I think foreign players would help raise the quality of our teams, and wouldnt affect player depth as long as there was some process from the ARU to ensure that that foriegn players were not all in the same position.
Obviously teams wouldn’t have to sign foreign players, but they could have the flexibility to do so if they wished.
Yesterday it was announced that Freddy Michelak signed for the Sharks again, and in both New Zealand and South Africa, it is common to have foreign players playing Super Rugby. Carlos Spencer played for the Lions and then became their assistant coach.
Apart from strengthening our Super Rugby teams, I think our players can benefit from playing alongside experienced players from other nations, especially an up and coming players playing next to an experienced Northern Hemisphere international.
Many European players have expressed a desire to play in the Super Rugby and I am sure many island players based in Europe would love to play their rugby closer to home.
More foreign players in Australian Super Rugby teams would also provide more publicity and make our super teams a bit more glamourous.
While this shouldnt be a primary concern, in our saturated football market, a Johnny Wilkinson or Michelak would benefit rugby and perhaps increase crowd numbers.
Thoughts, Roarers?
Join The Roar rugby editor Christy Doran, former Wallaby Matt Toomua and a cast of regular and special guests as they look at the biggest issues in the game on The Roar Rugby Podcast. If you’re looking for great odds on the next game check out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Chances are you’re about to lose. Set a deposit limit.