Quote mat="mat"plenty of other players it applies to and no ones challenged it yet. Stopping people getting round overseas quota by getting eu/kolpak passports was the key reason the fed trained rule was brought in so would think RFL have had a good look at legality of it.
Think our only argument re: sammut could be if we had known the crusaders players were going to get dispensations for duration of their next contract, we'd have given him a longer one. Maybe a surprise announcement of an option for a further couple of years that we forgot to announce when we signed him, like leeds forgetting to announce lee smiths re-signing last year (although doubt we could do it as original contract will have been lodged with RFL when we registered him).'"
I'm no questioning it legally I just don't think it's fair if the player is committed to representing a country within the European Federation as they are contributing to European Rugby league. I agree with it to stop teams building up loads of Kolpak players or Aussies with a Greek passport though.
I reckon it would be better if the rule was say if said player has played in 50% of the nations games over the last two years he gets one year off the quota?
I'm obviously biased because I want Sammut and Nas to both be here next year and under the rules one can't be (I think?) but I thing in the case of Jarrod Sammut it is detrimental to the greater good (or at least would be if he had a Maltese passport). Sammut is commited to playing for Malta and as a high profile player in Britain this can only help the growth of the game in Malta thereby helping us as it would help to spread interest in Superleague.
One other thing I thought of - would Gareth Widdop count as non-fed trained? Seems daft if he did
