News

207 Foreigners in Top 14

Thursday 28th August 2008

Who needs Frenchmen? South African Shaun Sowerby has made a career for himself in France

Your eyes do not deceive you. The Top 14 kicked-off last Tuesday with no less than 207 foreigners in France's top division. Add to that another 165 �trangers in the ProD2 and you've got the makings of a hot debate.

The foreign 'invasion' of France continues - Saffers, Aussies, Kiwis, Englishmen, Georgians, Canadians, you made it - if there's a rugby playing nation out there, they've got an ex-pat rugby community in France.

From Paris to Perpignan, Biarritz to Bourgoin, 22 nations in all have representatives in L'Hexagone. South Africans lead the way; 48 of them ply their trade in the land of cheese and wine.

We'll save you from doing the maths, 207 foreigners (up from 185 last year) divided by 14 teams comes to an average of 14.78 per team. We're not in the habit of chopping players into little pieces, so lets call it 15. That's right, you could just about have a league in France made up entirely of foreigner players.

Only the 'foreign legion' isn't exactly spread evenly over the fifteen positions of a standard team. 43 of those ex-pats are props. Seems the French are a little short on beef (don't tell the English!).

Jokes aside, the ever-growing flow of players, from the Southern Hemisphere especially, is stirring hot debate on both sides of the equator, and rightly so.

In France, opinions are fiercely divided, as one would expect. Since the World Cup, rugby's popularity has reached levels never seen before and the influx of foreign 'stars' is going a long way to filling stadiums all over the country.

But is it really good for French rugby? When clubs like big-spenders Brive have 24 foreigners on their books, it begs the question as to where talented young Frenchmen are supposed to find a spot. The very 'Frenchness' of the Top 14 is under threat as smaller clubs like Mont-de-Marsan are forced to overstep their budgets to keep up with the 'arms race'.

While benchmark club Toulouse have not added any foreigners to their squad this year, recruiting only three new players, all of whom are French (though Fred Michalak is to returning to La Ville Rose from the Sharks in South Africa) - on any given day their Ernest Wallon training ground is littered with South Africans, Tongans, Argentinians, and others.

But the Top 14 champions pale in comparison to clubs like Toulon, who are slowly starting to look like the United Nations of rugby (Springbok loose forward Joe van Niekerk is due to arrive next week to bolster the troops).

Toulouse coach Guy Nov�s has lamented the situation himself, but has justified the clubs' tactics by highlighting the fact that when his French stars are taken from him for the November and Six Nations Tests, someone must fill the jerseys. And when players of the quality of Shaun Sowerby or Finau Maka come relatively cheap, who can blame him?

Of course with the addition of the ELVs to this year's competition, Southern Hemisphere players with experience under the new laws are more attractive than ever.

As alarming as the mind-boggling numbers in the top division is the fact that the figure of 165 'mercenaries' in the second division ProD2 is actually a step down from the 182 of last year!

One can make a strong argument, however, that the Top 14's 'foreign attraction' is actually good for the standard of the world game. It has been reported that there are nearly 100 Georgians playing in France, in all divisions, and countries like Italy and Canada rely heavily on the French League to give their top players exposure to rugby at the highest level.

The cries of despair from the South need no repeating. We've all heard the despondent pleas from fans in South Africa and New Zealand for someone to do something to stop the 'player drain.'

But what can realistically be done? Turn the tide perhaps?

Let's all cross our fingers and hope that Fred Michalak returns to France and shines, all the while speaking of his "Southern Adventure' and the things he learnt in glowing terms.

With the Australian Rugby Union now also opening it's Super 14 doors to foreign players, perhaps some of those 'homeless' young French talents will trek the other way and add some of that trademark 'flair' to the game down South. It would be a healthier way of spicing things up than trying to change all the laws.

By Ross Hastie.