Gavin van den Berg did not meet the residency requirements when he played two qualifying games with the Lions. The Spanish Federation speaks of “an alleged forgery” of his passport.
The alleged falsification of a player’s passport and the negligence of the Federation in the control of that documentation leaves the Spanish rugby team without the place in the 2023 World Cup in France that it had won on the field. The International Federation (World Rugby), assuming the decision taken by an independent committee, has resolved thatlos lions they misaligned in two of the qualifying matches, stripping them of the points they earned for those wins.
As a consequence, they fall from second to fourth place in the qualifying tournament, behind Romania (which qualifies directly for France 2023) and Portugal (who will play in the playoffs).
The claim against Spain was presented precisely by the Romanian Federation and was based on the fact that Gavin van den Berg, a player of South African origin that the Santos team had incorporated in December 2021, do not meet the conditions of residence. These rules establish that, at that time, to acquire the status of ‘eligible’ by residence, the player must have remained uninterruptedly in our country for the previous three years. It is also said that, “as a guide”, but without clarifying whether it is indicative or exhaustive, that should suppose a physical presence of at least ten months in each of those years.
The player to whom the claim referred established his residence in Spain from the beginning of the 2018/19 season but a prolonged trip abroad, coinciding with his vacations, meant that one of those three seasons did not reach those ten months of stay in Spain. our pass A detail that the Spanish Federation did not verify when it received the documentation from the Van den Berg club, Alcobendas, so that it would stop occupying a place as a foreigner. At that moment he acquires, for the FER, the condition of selectable.
The Spanish Federation says that “The harsh sanction occurs as a result of an alleged falsification of the aforementioned player’s passport”so “continue with the extraordinary disciplinary procedure initiated at the time”, a procedure that had not been disclosed until now and that can fully affect national competitions.
It is noteworthy that the violation of the regulations occurs in relation to a player who was not among the starters and not even among the usual substitutes of coach Santiago Santos. Lexus Alcobendas left pillar Gavin van den Berg was only called up for two of the ten games. He only played the two matches against the weakest rival in the tournament, the Netherlands, and in both cases he took the field in the second half, with the match already decided, although he scored a try in the visit to Amsterdam.
The highest body of international rugby has also decided to sanction Spain with 25,000 pounds, according to the statement from the Spanish Federation, which has a period of two weeks to appeal.
It is not the first time that the Spanish team has been left out of a World Cup due to the same circumstancea. In 2018, the scandal that was started by the biased arbitration of the Romanian Iordachescu against the Lions also concluded with a sanction to these for the improper alignment of two players.
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