Quote:
Originally Posted by
geysir
'New Zealand Football chief executive Andy Martin said on Tuesday that his organisation believes Wynne is eligible to play for New Zealand based on Article 6 of the Fifa statutes.'
That interpretation of article 6 is misplaced.
'it is understood that Article 6 of the Fifa statutes relates to players who were born with dual nationality, giving them the ability to represent more than one national association at international level.'
Nope
Article 6 applies to a player whose single nationality qualifies him for more than one association.
However a NZ citizenship only qualifies a player to play for NZ and likewise a South African citizenship qualifies only for SA.
Therefore, the New Zealand FA, by using article 6, are trying to argue that Wynne' SA citizenship qualified him to play for NZ.
That's about as dumb as you can get (outside the borders of the IFA).
Even Blatter would be tempted to have a good laugh at that one.
All NZ had to do was just register Wynne with FIFA as if he was a regular dual national player and make it known that they had not kidnapped him from Africa.
I casually skimmed through that bit and the two subsequent paragraphs in light of the actual wording of the regulation having been quoted and distracted by the emphasis on the correct applicability of article 7 (as well as juicy extra info on the UAE and Australian proposals previously mentioned by Yann Hafner), somehow completely misreading the gist of it and missing what is quite the clanger. :o
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ben Strang
It is understood that Article 6 of the Fifa statutes relates to players who were born with dual nationality, giving them the ability to represent more than one national association at international level.
For instance, a player born in the Faroe Islands has Danish nationality, and may choose to represent either Denmark or the Faroe Islands in international football matches.
Oceania-born footballing legend Christian Karembeu is an example of the rule in action. Born in New Caledonia, Karembeu represented France in international football due to having French citizenship, rather than the island nation.
A player born in the Faroes (there is no such thing as Faroese nationality) can only represent Denmark if he shares a territorial connection with Denmark by virtue of birth of parents/grandparents in Denmark or having resided there for two years. He isn't just automatically eligible by virtue of being Faroese (born in the Faroes) or because the Faroese also happen to share Danish nationality.
That would be to suggest that a player born in one of England, NI, Scotland or Wales would be eligible to play for any of the other three besides the territory in which he was born simply on account of his birth in the UK/British citizenship, which is a major misinterpretation.
Also, Christian Karembeu first played for France in 1992, long before the introduction of the current article 6 and the significant rule changes post-2004. The rule under which he was eligible to play for France then on account of his French nationality read:
"Any player who is a naturalised citizen of a country in virtue of that country’s laws shall be eligible to play for a national or representative team of that country."
To the best of my knowledge, there was no rule in place at the time (other than an internal agreement amongst the British associations or unwritten convention) that obstructed players of a nationality shared by one or more teams from choosing to play for any of those teams sharing that nationality.
Karembeu moved to France at the age of 17 in 1988 and first played for France in 1992, so would have been eligible on account of residence anyway had the current rules been in place then and had article 6 actually applied to him then. Also, New Caledonia were only admitted to FIFA in 2004. I'm not sure it would even be fair to assume that article 6 would apply to Karembeu were he to appear on the scene today. French nationality is shared by only two teams, according to this; France and Tahiti. Meanwhile, New Caledonia has had separate citizenship since 1999. Isn't it therefore more correct to say that article 7 would have applied to Karembeu were the current rules in place back in the early '90s along with the present situation of distinct nationality? Obviously, if France and New Caledonia still shared a common nationality nowadays, article 6 would act as the distinguisher in order to discern who was and who was not eligible to play for the teams of the two respective territories.
If anyone wants an example of the rule in action, they need look no further than any player who plays for one of the four British associations.
Edit: Just checking back through my emails/old posts and I see Yann Hafner informed me that New Caledonia are actually one of the teams that share French nationality even though they are missing from the list I linked to above (along with Gibraltar). That would appear to conflict with the information in another link I included above which suggested that New Caledonia had a distinct citizenship since 1999, however. Either way, I don't think it would be correct or appropriate to describe Christian Karembeu's international career as being an example of the rule in action.