7 nations qualify automatically. www.sportinglife.com/rugby-leagu ... -world-cup

7 nations qualify automatically. www.sportinglife.com/rugby-leagu ... -world-cup

Seems fair enough.

Giving a bogus nation like Scotland --- where there is no professional or even semi-professional domestic competition --- an automatic qualification, is a joke.

The only nations that should have automatic qualification are those with full time professional or semi-professional teams: Australia, New Zealand, England, France, Papua-New Guinea (which has a team in the Queensland Cup), and Fiji (which will have a team in the NSW Cup in 2016).

There is a small pool of money to run qualification tournaments this time, and I'd much rather that money was spent on getting sides like Russia, Serbia, Canada, Italy, USA, Jamacia etc up to speed and to tournaments then spent on putting on games for France and Scotland etc who will qualify anyway.

I't's a good decision because it allows us to spend what little money there is on minnow countries.

It's a joke that they've let clubs that actually progressed well in the last tournament have automatic qualification?

What is a joke is when people invent their own criteria for qualification which has absolutely nothing to do with how good that nation actually is at playing the game!

All teams should have to qualify, with the only exception being the host nation.

As mentioned, granting 'Scotland' automatic qualification is laughable.

7 teams automatically qualifying is a joke, imo the only nations that should qualify automatically are the hosts and the defending champions.

And given we only play the four nations and NRL/SL players rarely turn out for nations until the RLWC how would they qualify? You want eng/AUs/NZ to be hammering the likes of Ireland, Cook isl or Canada?

Why? The ony other sport who has a qualification process for every nation is football. Even they think it's pointless with some of the hammerings.

I'd love International RL to be competitive enough so that all nations should have to qualify. But it's not. A qualification system is totally unecessary for the top nations.
The 7 nations mentioned seem reasonable to me.

there is logic to this, the problem is that Scotland etc are barely playing games at all so qualification would be a great chance to actually get some games on.

IMO a couple of ways of making International RL competitive is to have a proper qualification system and a proper international calendar, not just for full internationals but also at age group level i.e. U21's/U19's/U17's. I must admit the chances of this happening anytime soon are slim to none while the NRL holds the power.

I would also bring in a rule where by once a person as represented a nation at full international level he cannot change his country of allegiance in the future.