Local rugby.......is it local

[Ecky]

Back in the 80's when i played (anceint history) WA rugby was basically an ex-pats game. 1st teams - and most of the lower grades made up of Kiwi's, Safa's, Brits, Queenslanders and New south welshmen. It was very rare for a born and bred WA player to get to 1st grade.

I also played in those ancient history days - made it to 1st grade at Uni, having played ALL of my rugby in WA. We were few and far between - I can recall a couple of others at Uni and a small handful of others at the other clubs, but mainly ex-pats as Jasper says.

Funnily enough, I am in the same position as a local ref - there's very few of us who either played or started reffing in WA.

[Burgs]

I think, from arms length from it all, that if a local player can't reach firstsagainst imports then they probably won't be reaching S14 level.

As most would know, I am a pretty parochial Western Australian but in this instance I think we need to encourage as much importation as possible to lift our local standard across the board and hopefully lead to another layer of competition in the future.

Must be all this damn Queensland air...