Re: Con Mika : Sun Oct 16, 2011 12:26 pm
Fully wrote:
I'm pretty sure that Rangi is fully committed to Cas. He could have seen out his current contract at Cas and still played for Eng this season.
Concur with that. Rangi has suggested it would be nice to play for a top side with the chance of winning silverware at some time in the future and you can't begrudge him that.
However, were he serious about wanting to move imminently he would have made it a lot easier for himself by not signing his contract extension. Then one of the top clubs could secure him in 2 yrs time for free or get him earlier for a more modest transfer fee. By signing an extension he has bumped his transfer fee up and so immediately made himself much less attractive to other clubs.
As regards nationality, it is nowhere near as straightforward as people make out.
Eg. If you are born in 1 country but then your family emigrates to another when you're a young kid such that you are educated in that country, go through the sporting systems in that country and call that country home, is it fair to say your nationality is that of the country where you were born even though you really don't know anything about that country? And that you cannot play for the national side of the country where you have spent the vast majority of your life?
If you were strict and said 'yes' to the above, then an awful lot of international players that have played for NZ and Australia over the years wouldn't have been able to.
Before people say "that's nowt like the Rangi Chase situation" - I agree. I'm just using this extreme example to illustrate a point. If you say that the player in the above situation should be able to play for his adopted country then the question arises as to where you draw the line. Some people say you've got to have been born in the country for whom you will play nationally, some say you must have citizenship, some are happy to let you do so if either of your parents or even your grandparents were born in that country.
To avoid any confusion, international sports have drawn up clearly defined qualifying criteria which essentially cover all of the above. On that criteria, Rangi Chase qualifies to play for England and as he expressed his wish to do so the only question now is whether the coach deems him good enough to pick him.
I appreciate this will divide opinion in the same way that who is the best left centre we have will divide opinion. But for anyone to say I'm not gonna support my national side because they've picked a player who I consider shouldn't qualify to play for them is just plain pathetic...
I'd rather see talented Aussies like Dobson green paea ect Show us how rugby league is ment to be played than see average players like westerman, sharpe and Ellis have a go at it. Yes we have lots of Aussies but at least it didn't stop us giving several youngsters first team rugby last year, unlike fc who were the only team not to give a youngster a go and also where the only team not to kick a 40-20 last season probably due to there old average injury prone half backs. Throwing six figure money at has beens like long and Horne has clearly done your club no favours and with a lack of British halfs around can you really blame clubs for looking overseas?
