Gatland's Law is far too soft

In my opinion, Gatland's Law is far too soft. We should not be picking any foreign based Welsh player for the autumn internationals. Imagine the team we could field if we only stuck to players playing in Wales:

15. Liam Williams
14. Steffan Evans
13. Jonathan Davies
12. Scott Williams
11. Hallam Amos
10. Dan Biggar
9. Rhys Webb
8. Morgan Allen
7. Sam Warburton
6. Dan Lydiate
5. Alun Wyn Jones
4. Bradley Davies
3. Samson Lee
2. Ken Owens
1. Rob Evans

Subs ?

LordDowlais wrote:Subs ?

16. Gethin Jenkins
17. Scott Baldwin
18. Dillon Lewis
19. Jake Ball
20. Justin Tipuric
21. Gareth Davies
22. Sam Davies
23. Cory Allen

And the 8 squad players?

Welly wrote: And the 8 squad players?

24. Paul James
25. Emyr Phillips
26. Rhodri Jones
27. Josh Turnbull
28. Aled Davies
29. Rhys Patchell
30. Alex Cuthbert
31. Tom James

First off there's no such thing as Gatlands Law and secondly we have got the resources to ignore players because of where they play.

What I would say is if there are players of equal quality and both on form and fully etc vying for the same position then the Welsh based player should get the nod.

Out of the players you named initially then we would only have to pick 2 from outside Wales (Faletau and North) so its hardly going to be damaging things if we did.

We could all name players from all the Regions but it doesn't mean they are all up to International standard.

With just four teams, WRU would have to have control over what positions could be filled by NWQP players, if only domestic players were to be included.

I have a vague recollection from a few years back when three of the regions had NWQP Number 8s (Lyons, Rush and one other I think). Such a situation could not be allowed to occur.

I think that from the recent Wales squads the following players will be considered as playing outside Wales: Faletau, North, Roberts, Charteris, Priestland, Jarvis. Of those I expect the three picks to be Faletau, North and Roberts.

I suspect that the following may be eligible for selection as they are still on contracts signed before the new participation agreement: Halfpenny, Francis, Moriarty.

That means the big casualties are likely to be Charteris and Priestland.

Wales has insufficient depth to ignore all overseas players if they want to remain competitive. Regional rugby is way off the pace to develop and improve real test quality players. The "squad" listed above simply isn't good enough and distinctly second tier.

offload wrote:Wales has insufficient depth to ignore all overseas players if they want to remain competitive.  Regional rugby is way off the pace to develop and improve real test quality players.  The "squad" listed above simply isn't good enough and distinctly second tier.

Exactly.