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Stuff: ‘Dark day’ for league

Great Britain coach Brian Noble this week called for the Kiwis to lose their points for breaking the rules while Kangaroos coach Ricky Stuart called Fien’s selection “an embarrassment” to the Kiwis.

The Kiwi Rugby League team has been docked 2 points after fielding an ineligible player in last weekends test against Great Britain. After losing to Australia in the cricket yesterday this is just a kick in the teeth. I can’t believe that we need to field players who can’t really be considered eligible except by some highly questionable and liberal interpretation of the rules.

It’s true that there are a number of players in both the NZ and Australian camps that are eligible for either country, but having a parent or grandparent born in the players declared country is quite straight forward. Wouldn’t anybody thinking of applying the rule to great grandparents as well get confirmation first?

It’s condescending to the team, the player, and other players who are available for selection in that position. It takes away from all the hard work that the team put in after coming back off a loss in the first test against Australia, just losing the second, and then going on to win against Great Britain.

I really hope we win the rugby against England at Twickenham on Sunday otherwise I think I’m just going to go back to watching snooker for a while.