RA considers allowing Dave Rennie to select players outside Giteau Law

Rugby Australia is considering allowing Wallabies coach Dave Rennie to have two or three picks of overseas-based players each year.

World Cup second-rowers Rory Arnold and Izack Rodda are now playing overseas.

Rugby Australia is seriously considering allowing Wallabies coach Dave Rennie to have two or three picks of overseas-based players each year as it looks to tweak the Giteau Law rather than abolish it entirely.

Under normal circumstances, the Giteau Law only allows those players who have brought up 60 Tests and a minimum of six years of Super Rugby to be eligible for selection in the Wallabies from abroad, although most of the players Rennie would be targeting would fall well short of meeting this exacting criteria.

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The World Cup second-row pairing of Rory Arnold and Izack Rodda, for example, have 26 and 25 Tests respectively under their belts, which means they would require a special exemption if they were to be brought back from Europe to play in this year’s Tests.

The one loophole created by former Wallabies coach Michael Cheika allowed players who have signed on for the next season of Super Rugby to be chosen if required. It was under this rule that Brumbies halfback Nic White — now going through his isolation period in Sydney after returning from Exeter — was able to compete at last year’s World Cup.

RA director of rugby Scott Johnson said on Monday the number of world-class locks who had moved offshore since the World Cup — Arnold, Adam Coleman, Rodda and Harry Hockings — meant Australia might have to be inventive in the way it addressed the problem. Yet if there was any position that might encourage RA to tweak the Giteau Law, it would surely be the second row, which looms as a major problem for Rennie.

“Do we give the coach two or three picks each year?” Johnson asked. “We are meeting next week and I have asked the general managers (of the four Super Rugby franchises) to come back with their opinions because it is the type of law that affects so many. Once we have their feedback we will then take something to the board. Before the (Test) season starts we should have a rationale in place and will know where we stand.

“We have to look at the unintended consequences. If you make it open slather then it becomes football, soccer (where the country’s best players are all based overseas.) We have to have a marker here.”

There is a weakening resolve to keep the Giteau Law in place as Australian rugby comes to terms with the fact that with less money coming from the broadcast deal, the Wallaby jersey might soon not be enough to keep the country’s top players onshore.

“Do I think we need our best players available for the Wallabies … absolutely,” said Melbourne Rebels chief executive Baden Stephenson. “But I don’t think we should look at the Giteau Law in isolation. If it could be done in alignment with our contracting model, I think that would be best.”

If a seemingly inadvertent tweet posted in New Zealand on Monday was correct — and RA was strongly hinting it wasn’t — it may be that the Wallabies’ first Test for this year won’t be played until October 10.

The tweet, which was hastily withdrawn, indicated that the first two Bledisloe Cup Tests against the All Blacks would be played on October 10 and 17, while Bledisloe III and IV are scheduled for November 1 and 8. The October 10 Test was scheduled for Wellington, but the venues for the remaining Tests are still to be decided, apparently because New Zealand is keen on staging three of the four internationals.

Australia is understood to be holding out for a 2-2 split, although the obvious sticking point is that the Kiwis are already able to cope with capacity crowds whereas the best Australia could provide, even as COVID-19 restrictions are eased, would be a crowd of 15,000 in Queensland.

However, the Kiwis could have a problem of their own.

A majority of New Zealand’s Super Rugby players would appear to be unhappy with the make-up of the All Blacks coaching group headed by Ian Foster.

According to a poll of at least 15 players from each of the five Super Rugby franchises, almost half — 46 per cent — believe NZ Rugby got it wrong in choosing Foster ahead of Scott Robertson, the Crusaders coach who has won the past three Super Rugby titles. It is a view also widely shared on this side of the ditch.

Meanwhile, the three-day meeting of general managers will deal with the issue of player agents and whether they are working for the overall good of the game or for personal profit. It comes as all sports look closely at the role of managers. RA is keeping an eye on how the NRL and its 16 clubs fare after unanimously supporting a ban on managers simultaneously representing coaches and players.