Pasifika SR team
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I'm clearly not making the point well, but what I'm trying to say is that this team probably can't (long term) have 80% PI qualified players without becoming even weaker, and there will be a growing population of PI ineligible players who may want to play for MS.
Personally speaking I think it would be better if they just pitched it as the NZ Pasifika team, which is what I think it will end up becoming anyway.
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@gt12 said in Pasifika SR team:
So, in the short term they may be able to set up a local academy and harvest better talent, but in the long term the population (and player numbers) are likely to decrease as there will be fewer island-born players and fewer players eligible for the islands in NZ and Oz.
Samoa and Tonga will always be disadvantaged because of their small populations (202K and 106K, respectively). I'm sure that Senio etc believe there will always be local talent available, even if they come to NZ for education. Fakatava, as a recent example.
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@gt12 said in Pasifika SR team:
I'm clearly not making the point well, but what I'm trying to say is that this team probably can't (long term) have 80% PI qualified players without becoming even weaker, and there will be a growing population of PI ineligible players who may want to play for MS.
Personally speaking I think it would be better if they just pitched it as the NZ Pasifika team, which is what I think it will end up becoming anyway.
Then we do agree. Long term it is unlikely to be viable, reducing numbers as you say. Actually, short term it isn't either. They could poach from the Warriors. Maybe that is the master plan, get PI players away from league in Sth Auckland and into union...
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@snowy said in Pasifika SR team:
@gt12 said in Pasifika SR team:
I'm clearly not making the point well, but what I'm trying to say is that this team probably can't (long term) have 80% PI qualified players without becoming even weaker, and there will be a growing population of PI ineligible players who may want to play for MS.
Personally speaking I think it would be better if they just pitched it as the NZ Pasifika team, which is what I think it will end up becoming anyway.
Then we do agree. Long term it is unlikely to be viable, reducing numbers as you say. Actually, short term it isn't either. They could poach from the Warriors. Maybe that is the master plan, get PI players away from league in Sth Auckland and into union...
Now we're talking
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Yep, but looking forward (and looking at the declining birth rates of these countries) my question is whether these weaknesses will get worse.
A bit more reading shows that there is projected to be a divergence - Samoa is projected to keep growing through to 2050, getting up towards 250,000.
However, Tonga is apparently going the other way, going to about 80,000 odd by 2050.
Overall, that indicates that in the medium term at least the population issue within the islands isn’t as bad as I thought.
However the issue of ineligible NZ-born PIs will get worse I guess.
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@gt12 said in Pasifika SR team:
However the issue of ineligible NZ-born PIs will get worse I guess.
Yep.
They can always spend 5 years in the more northern PI's to qualify though if they were born in NZ and don't have the Grandparent rights...(sarcasm emoji thingy). -
With this kind of thing:
Did Mark Robinson et al actually think an NZ Pacific franchise would be ever be a good PR thing for the NZRU?
Welcome to years of trolling anytime an NZ born and raised Samoan happens to make the All Blacks if at some time early in his career he happened to have played for an NZ franchise based in Penrose rather than another one 9.5km away in Sandringham.
Kefu kind of has a point, though from a Tongan POV. Tonga, unlike Samoa, actually do produce some good players that enter the NZ system and go right to the top. Although they already enter at schoolboy level and this won't increase any of it.
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and this .....
https://www.reddit.com/r/rugbyunion/comments/muo8nm/incriminating_recording_of_nzrpa_boss_released/
Get this horrible fucking franchise out of our domestic system, please!
I don't fucking want it. Any of it. Aucklanders should be Aucklanders (or Shoreites), not whites and browns.
Solves nothing, won't last anyway, but brings shit loads of negative baggage.
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@rapido said in Pasifika SR team:
With this kind of thing:
Did Mark Robinson et al actually think an NZ Pacific franchise would be ever be a good PR thing for the NZRU?
Welcome to years of trolling anytime an NZ born and raised Samoan happens to make the All Blacks if at some time early in his career he happened to have played for an NZ franchise based in Penrose rather than another one 9.5km away in Sandringham.
Kefu kind of has a point, though from a Tongan POV. Tonga, unlike Samoa, actually do produce some good players that enter the NZ system and go right to the top. Although they already enter at schoolboy level and this won't increase any of it.
Isn't it good to see Kefu's worry etc, after the stirling performance he had for Tonga!
FFS how short the memories and pot kettle comes to mind! -
@rapido firstly Totai, how was your experience playing for Tonga? Love it did you? Honoured to represent them were you?
Secondly, i honestly could not have given a single fuck if Fekitoa, Frizzel and Fifita played for Tonga over NZ. Not one single solitary fuck.
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@mariner4life said in Pasifika SR team:
@rapido firstly Totai, how was your experience playing for Tonga? Love it did you? Honoured to represent them were you?
Secondly, i honestly could not have given a single fuck if Fekitoa, Frizzel and Fifita played for Tonga over NZ. Not one single solitary fuck.
Lomu?
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@kirwan said in Pasifika SR team:
@mariner4life said in Pasifika SR team:
@rapido firstly Totai, how was your experience playing for Tonga? Love it did you? Honoured to represent them were you?
Secondly, i honestly could not have given a single fuck if Fekitoa, Frizzel and Fifita played for Tonga over NZ. Not one single solitary fuck.
Lomu?
did Tonga exist in 1994?
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Lomu was born in Auckland wasn’t he?
I’m quite happy for players born and raised in other countries to be “off limits”. But good luck telling that to them if they would actually prefer to play for the ABs.
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@rancid-schnitzel said in Pasifika SR team:
Lomu was born in Auckland wasn’t he?
Yes. He had the choice and chose the country of his birth (I'm a cynic so I won't suggest that there might have been other reasons too). Far be it for me to suggest that that will just continue.
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@mariner4life said in Pasifika SR team:
@kirwan said in Pasifika SR team:
@mariner4life said in Pasifika SR team:
@rapido firstly Totai, how was your experience playing for Tonga? Love it did you? Honoured to represent them were you?
Secondly, i honestly could not have given a single fuck if Fekitoa, Frizzel and Fifita played for Tonga over NZ. Not one single solitary fuck.
Lomu?
did Tonga exist in 1994?
Rugby team started in 1924.
My main point is NZ born Tongans and Samoans that have played for the ABs have been some of our best players.
If they are now to be pressured into playing for countries of their heritage instead of where they were born, we are not only weakening our Super rugby depth, but the AB depth as well.
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@rapido said in Pasifika SR team:
and this .....
https://www.reddit.com/r/rugbyunion/comments/muo8nm/incriminating_recording_of_nzrpa_boss_released/
Get this horrible fucking franchise out of our domestic system, please!
I don't fucking want it. Any of it. Aucklanders should be Aucklanders (or Shoreites), not whites and browns.
Solves nothing, won't last anyway, but brings shit loads of negative baggage.
Negative baggage to people with a negative outlook for sure.
You don't want it? Nobody asked you to play for them or support them. It's a way to deal to a decades long issue where other pacific nations have been held back. NH teams get strengthened, NZ and Oz get strengthened. I'd like to see a more competitive Fiji/ Samoa/Tonga in WR. I'm getting a bit sick of the same old same old.
WR have done something with providing some money. NZ have done something by providing a comp. Oz will have their arm twisted to agree to the setup. -
@rapido said in Pasifika SR team:
With this kind of thing:
Did Mark Robinson et al actually think an NZ Pacific franchise would be ever be a good PR thing for the NZRU?
That would be the same Totai Kefu that was born in Tonga and played for Australia? Fuck off you raving hypocrite.
The board at NZR needs to be sacked.
