The NRL’s representative eligibility rules are broken. Here’s how to fix them

The NRL has finally seen the light and will undertake a review of the antiquated eligibility rules that are harming both international rugby league and State of Origin.

On Thursday, ARL Commission chairman Peter V’landys revealed an overhaul could be on the cards pending an off-season review of the current guidelines. It’s long overdue.

The review has been driven by the noise surrounding the likes of Payne Haas, Tino Fa’asuamaleaui and Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow potentially switching their allegiance from Australia to Samoa at the end of the season.

Most would agree the star trio representing the country of their heritage is good for the international game, especially given that they can still represent their respective states in Origin due to Samoa’s status as a tier two rugby league nation.

There will, however, be an argument that a further relaxation of the eligibility rules will dilute the essence of Origin. But it’s an uneducated view.

As the rules stand, players who make themselves available to play for NSW or Queensland are prohibited from representing a tier-one nation other than Australia. In other words, England or New Zealand.

Kalyn Ponga, Kaeo Weekes and Addin Fonua-Blake would benefit from the potential change to eligibility rules.Credit: Getty/Monique Westermann

But what makes New Zealand or England different to the other nations? You could argue Samoa and Tonga have stronger teams than both those countries.

Addin Fonua-Blake is prohibited from playing State of Origin because he represented New Zealand in one Test in 2017.

He was born in Meadowbank in Sydney’s west and played junior footy for Mascot Jets. How is he any less of a New South Welshman than the others who wear the sky blue?

Why can’t the Sydney-born, Bronte-raised Victor Radley play for NSW if he chooses to honour his heritage and represent England instead of Australia? The Samoa-born Stephen Crichton represents NSW. The West Australia-born Kalyn Ponga dons the Maroons jersey.

After all, they all fulfil the main Origin criteria, which is to have lived in NSW or QLD before their 13th birthday. No one wants to change that aspect of the eligibility regulations, but the tiering system was designed for an era before the second generation of migrant families, who call Australia home but are proud of their ancestral roots, had such an impact on the game.

If you go back two decades, NSW used 22 players in the 2005 State of Origin series. None were eligible to play for any regularly playing rugby league nation other than Australia.

In this year’s series, across NSW and Queensland, there were 15: Brian To’o, Stephen Crichton, Jarome Luai, Payne Haas, Spencer Leniu, Stefano Utoikamanu, Ponga, Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow, Xavier Coates, Robert Toia, Valentine Holmes, Mo Fotuaika, Josh Papalii, Tino Fa’asuamaleaui and Jermiah Nanai.

Any change to the Origin eligibility criteria needs to be seen through the lens of what is best for international rugby league.

Jarome Luai, Stephen Crichton, Brian To’o and Spencer Leniu playing for Samoa at the 2022 World Cup.Credit: Getty Images

The argument that a player must choose the country he wants to represent at a young age and be held to that nation for the remainder of his career is detrimental to the international game.

Take Isaiya Katoa, for example. His heritage enables him to play for Tonga, New Zealand and Australia. If he had been forced to choose Australia when he entered the NRL, he would have had to wait virtually his whole career for the chance to get in front of the likes of Nathan Cleary, Mitchell Moses and Daly Cherry-Evans. Instead, he can represent tier-two Tonga without having to give up on the chance of playing Origin.

To avoid having quality players on the sidelines, allegiances should be tied to four-year World Cup cycles. At the end of the 2026 World Cup, each player must elect who they intend to represent over the next four years culminating in the 2030 tournament.

Turn it into a television event. Have a host on stage open an envelope announcing that, in 2027, “Kalyn Ponga will be taking his talents to New Zealand for the next four years”.

How the eligibility rules could work.Credit:

Give nations an incentive to go out and find third-party agreements with prospective corporate partners looking to aid their hopes of convincing a player to represent their nation over others they may also be eligible for.

It’s the best way to minimise the discrepancy between the $30,000 Origin match payments and the $3000 players receive for Test matches, a move designed to make international football the pinnacle of the sport.

Nor does forcing players to stick with their country of choice allow for father time. Petero Civoniceva was a mainstay in the Australian team for a decade, playing 45 games for the Kangaroos.

Denying him the chance to represent Fiji in the latter stages of his career when he didn’t warrant selection in the Australian team, all because he decided to represent Australia 15 years earlier, would have been doing the international game a disservice.

Why shouldn’t Utoikamanu represent his Tongan father, his Samoan mother, his Australian-born children and his Kiwi ancestry? He just needs to wait every four years to change.

At the end of the World Cup, any player from Harold Matthews all the way up to the NRL should have to stipulate the nation they want to represent for the next four years.

The legacy of the V’landys-Andrew Abdo regime in rugby league is secure. They will be remembered for saving the game during the COVID-19 pandemic, the venture into America through the Las Vegas season openers and the expansion into Perth and Papua New Guinea.

Now they could help transform rugby league into a genuinely global sport by overhauling the outdated rules.

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