Eligibility?

 I wrote the piece below a few months back for Scrum Magazine on the back of Edinburgh signing Jordan Venter and some of the furore that caused.  That same angst is to the fore again in the last week with the announcement that Edinburgh stand off Jaco Van Der Walt has emerged from quarantine following his wedding In South Africa and gone straight into the Scotland squad now that he has satisfied the residency requirements.

I agree with Richard Cockerill on this. Strongly agree.

"We play by the regulations that are there, I wouldn't blame the individual, or the country or the coach. Does it devalue (the cap)? I don't think it does, if you qualify and you're better than the people that are born and bred in that country, that's competition, that's life and that's the way it works"

That's the way it works!

A policy paper by the Scottish government states that, "As the world becomes more interconnected people need to move across international boundaries for work and for learning. This includes international students, researchers, artists, performers, people who want to grow their career or indeed just to experience life and work in a different culture."

Performers are mentioned and I like to think they don't just mean ballet dancers and actors but sports people too. And if we are to deny those, who come here to work and live and pay taxes,  the opportunity to represent the country they have chosen to live in is that not just ever so slightly discriminatory.

For me, it boils down to this. If they are mad enough to want to live here in this miserable country with its even more miserable weather for the requisite time to qualify then I'm delighted to welcome them into the fold. They aren't doing it for the glory, there's precious little of that in Scottish rugby.

The Scrum piece in full.

 On the back of Edinburgh signing Jordan Venter from South Africa there has been a lot of chatter criticising the club for denying local talent an opportunity and for allegedly not helping the national side.

I don’t accept local talent is being denied. If they were good enough they’d be chosen. What possible reason would the club have to select someone from South Africa if they considered he wasn’t as talented as a lad from say Prestonpans? Let’s face it if those players existed Edinburgh would save themselves all this grief and expense by just signing them instead.

Richard Cockerill’s oft repeated mantra is that you should stay in the fight. If the fight is for a pro rugby contract should rejection lead to giving up? What happened to try, try, again?

Equally if you are only playing rugby in the hope of a pro contract then your priorities may have gone a little awry. This is elite sport, not everyone gets chosen and it really doesn’t matter what the sport is there is always someone who ‘could have been a contender’.

Cockerill has brought through some decent SQ players lately. Darcy Graham, Luke Crosbie, George Taylor to name just a few and if you acknowledge that you have to accept its talent he respects and not flags.

I understand the disappointment that people feel when their son is not selected but you have to be honest with yourself. Would you want them to be picked just because they live close to the ground?

My own son was asked by his guidance teacher what he wanted to do when he was an adult and said “I want to play rugby for Scotland”.   He didn’t achieve his dream but that’s no different than 99% of all the others who had the same ambition. There are plenty of people who play rugby just for fun. 

Let’s take a couple of anonymous examples (very thinly disguised)

Player A. Born in England, schooled in England. Has a Fife born grandmother so qualifies to play for Scotland.

Player B, Born in South Africa, Schooled in SA. His mum is English so he holds an English passport. Not qualified to play for Scotland until he satisfies residency requirements.

Neither of these players have come through the Scottish system,  neither are Scottish and both could be described as denying locals an opportunity but one attracts huge amounts of negative publicity and the other is welcomed as the next messiah. Go figure. 

As an Edinburgh supporter I don’t care if the player comes from the moon. If the coaches think he can improve the team then he gets my vote. As a Scotland supporter if someone wants to come and live here for the required period to become Scots qualified then that player also gets my vote. 

 Let’s be realistic. Edinburgh and Glasgow exist to support the national side. They are franchises and not clubs in the true sense of the word. Rivalry between them is encouraged but only up to a point and after that it’s censored. To support the national side properly though I think they need to be successful. What use to international rugby are poorly motivated players who lose a lot of club games?  

Club success means you have to be pragmatic and pick players not because of their origins but because of their talent and on occasion because of their price. 

For all the criticism, Edinburgh’s Scots qualified ratio is still around 73% and as this year moves on that percentage will rise as Duhan van Der Merwe and Jaco Van Der Walt both join that group. 

There are only around 12 players on Edinburgh’s roster for season 20 -21 not SQ.  In among that group are Pierre Schoeman and Bill Mata.

Would we really want to deny the club those guys because of where they were born?