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14 hours ago, Bedfordshire Bronco said:

I was suggesting they become a heritage side rather representative of the grassroots

The problem is that RLI and LRLF have received some funding recently from the Irish and Lebanese governments and I'm not sure they would have done so if the national teams were being run entirely from the UK and Australia.

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11 minutes ago, damp squib said:

The problem is that RLI and LRLF have received some funding recently from the Irish and Lebanese governments and I'm not sure they would have done so if the national teams were being run entirely from the UK and Australia.

Fair enough. Sounds like the Lebanese need to find the own players and the Sydney Lebanese will have a rest! 

Probably for the best of the grassroots game

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On ‎01‎/‎07‎/‎2019 at 17:42, Damien said:

Its hard to know where the blame for this all lies and how much of it is the fault of the heritage players based in Australia and how much is the LRLF. The LRLF concentrating on developing the game domestically and playing internationals with these domestic players wouldn't be the worst outcome.

Well it will put the standard of their national team back many many decades. Not a great outcome. 

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2 hours ago, B rad said:

Well it will put the standard of their national team back many many decades. Not a great outcome. 

I suppose that depends if there are still decades of Lebanese qualified people in Australia. Lebanon aren't even that good a heritage team anyway and have argubly gone as far as they can in their current guise. They aren't even competing with Fiji at the moment.

The game in one country being built entirely on heritage players from another country thousands of miles away isn't great either. Especially if those heritage players think they are bigger than the game.

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1 hour ago, Damien said:

I suppose that depends if there are still decades of Lebanese qualified people in Australia. Lebanon aren't even that good a heritage team anyway and have argubly gone as far as they can in their current guise. They aren't even competing with Fiji at the moment.

The game in one country being built entirely on heritage players from another country thousands of miles away isn't great either. Especially if those heritage players think they are bigger than the game.

The team that played against Fiji was missing quite a few stars.

 

With nearly 80,000 Lebanese born Australians and over 230,000 Lebanese by ancestry, there is many decades worth of heritage players coming through.

new rise.jpg

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A few years ago, it became necessary in order to even field a team from Wales that the ''grandfather rule'' was introduced.

It allowed the organisers of international competition to field relatively competitive teams and create a spectacle.

But now, with home-grown governing bodies, sprouting up all over the place, we have to deal with their ambitions to run the game.

I think merit/ability is the only basis on which you can select an International team, so unless you scrap the grandfather rule, Farah's heritage players have a ''right'' to be selected.

As long as the grandfather rule exists, the unfortunate beginners, back in Lebanon (or Ireland, Jamaica etc.) won't get a look in until the quality they produce surpasses the heritage players and rightly so.

Its a bit rum for newly minted, happy amateurs in far flung places to attempt to grab power in this situation and select poorer players at the expense of pro's and compete in a World Cup.

They can't win. If they succeed in abolishing the grandfather rule and grabbing power and favouring home-grown players they will immediately plummet to the bottom of the world rankings and no longer be eligible for the World Cup.

It will also leave the pro' group disenfranchised (an enormous wasted resource). 

Having said that, they are often working alone in their home nations, struggling to develop the game, so unless we want to alienate them and kill off the game in its infancy we need to acknowledge their ''authority'' and nurture their growth.

I think we need to allow/create and assist them to play ''A'' team internationals, like the England Lionhearts and Welsh Dragonhearts. Thereby acknowledging both the rights of heritage players, and creating a terrific incentive for home grown players to get involved.

That way, home grown players can represent their country, whilst they develop the game at home and when they are of a suitable standard, can be drawn into the professional ranks and vie for full International honours.

Surely this is the ''business'' of the IRLF. There really is no conflict here. 

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On 02/07/2019 at 01:49, damp squib said:

If the squad are all based in Australia and the administration are all based in Australia, in what way is it a Lebanese National Team?

Administration is based in Lebanon

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On 02/07/2019 at 00:59, Bedfordshire Bronco said:

Fair enough - does the Cedars need to be run via Lebanon? 

Surely the administrative side could be based in Aus? 

A basic principle would be that the LRL is run in Lebanon 

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2 hours ago, Sports Prophet said:

A basic principle would be that the LRL is run in Lebanon 

Yes of course, that is the desirable mid to long term outcome, but they have to manage the ''how do we get from here to there stage''. It makes sense to maximise the attention grabbing potential of heritage players whilst nurturing the new intake at home until the heritage players are either not needed, or can't compete.

If they insist on doing without the heritage players at this stage, then they can't maintain their standing in the international merit table so would likely not qualify for the World Cup anyway.

Hopefully the RLIF can explain the reality of this to them (and make the most of all their assets) to speed the development of the game over there and (hopefully) avoid another (Greece) debacle.

I'd encourage them to play an 'A' team in the emerging nations fraternity.

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I think RL has to introduce a formal tiered system to manage the international game.
Tier 1 Aus, NZ and Eng.
Tier 2 France, PNG, Tonga, Samoa.
Tier 3 Fij, Sco, Wal, Ire (?)

Etc. 

Play round robin matches on a yearly basis, not even home and away but alternate each year. Just develop regular competition and rivalry. Then if and as required, promote or relegate to even up the tiers but it doesn't need to be a formal league process, more an application. The problem with test RL always comes back to two defining problems; regularity and walk-over scores. 

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7 hours ago, Stevoh said:

I think RL has to introduce a formal tiered system to manage the international game.
Tier 1 Aus, NZ and Eng.
Tier 2 France, PNG, Tonga, Samoa.
Tier 3 Fij, Sco, Wal, Ire (?)

Etc. 

Play round robin matches on a yearly basis, not even home and away but alternate each year. Just develop regular competition and rivalry. Then if and as required, promote or relegate to even up the tiers but it doesn't need to be a formal league process, more an application. The problem with test RL always comes back to two defining problems; regularity and walk-over scores. 

Fiji would beat several of those Tier Two teams on any given day.

Fiji are currently ranked Fifth by the RLIF

Talent is secondary to whether players are confident.

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14 hours ago, Allora said:

Fiji would beat several of those Tier Two teams on any given day.

Fiji are currently ranked Fifth by the RLIF

Very true And Fiji look like they are going to be producing quite a few home born NRL players in years to come as already the likes of Vunivalu and Radrada show there is so much talent there for Backs. 

 

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