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Matías Moroni has slammed World Rugby’s handling of player eligibility and the RWC 2023 draw. Rugby’s global governing body recently made two controversial decisions. The first saw the player eligibility change deleted by twelve months. The second saw the RWC 2023 draw not postponed.
On the one hand, World Rugby gave unions an additional twelve months to nationalize players that were produced by rivals. On the other hand, the draw for RWC 2023 was not delayed. Neither decision will benefit Moroni or his Pumas teammates.
Para comprar jugadores de las islas y armas sus barbaríans pasan la fecha y para el sorteo no ? Muy raro
— Matias Moroni (@tutemoroni) October 2, 2020
Moroni’s comment raised the point that World Rugby’s decisions lacked consistency. He called-out the governance for enabling unions to buy players and use them to arm their teams with foreigners. Despite an additional year for this policy there will be no added time for the RWC 2023 draw.
The draw for RWC 2023 will take place on December 14. The disruptions of COVID-19 mean that Japan is unable to play a match at all in 2020. World Rugby made the decision to use the rankings from January 01, 2020. The decision advantages Japan and Wales. Both teams are to be in higher bands than their current rankings.
Moroni has first hand experience of both player eligibility and RWC draws; he has played in two Rugby World Cups. Argentina’s first opponent at RWC 2019 was France. Moroni played against a team that included Bernard le Roux and Virimi Vakatawa. Both qualified for France as adults via residency.
Both Japan and Wales fielded players at RWC 2019 who qualified via residency as adults. They both intend to capture further New Zealand players. The May 2017 decision to change from a 36-month residency to 60 months will now enable both to do so.
Japan is “working on some New Zealand players playing for the Japanese team” and Wales intends to follow the residency qualification of Johnny NcNicoll with that of Willis Haloholo. Both played Super Rugby in their native New Zealand and moved to Wales to further their professional careers. They did so after not being capped by the All Blacks.
The delay will enable Haloholo to be capped by Wales. Meanwhile, Scotland will not need to wait two more years to cap Pierre Schoeman. Ireland has James Lowe in their sights. Lowe played against McNicholl in Super Rugby. Ireland may now also capture Australian Jarrad Butler, American Roman Salanoa and South Africans Chris Cloete and Keynan Knox.
Moroni is not alone in slamming residency rules. Sudamérica Rugby’s president Sebastián Piñeyrúa indicated that World Rugby made the decision to favor certain unions. His native Uruguay did not have residency qualified players at RWC 2019. Uruguay’s Tier 1 opponents did. One had an extreme example – Hadleigh Parkes. The New Zealander debuted for Wales at the age of 30. He arrived in the UK aged 27 and debuted for Wales on the same day that he completed three years eligibility. He no longer lives in Wales.
