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Fiji skipper Dominiko Waqaniburotu left looking for a new club

(Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)

Fiji World Cup skipper Dominiko Waqaniburotu is looking for a new club after it emerged in French media that he will not extend his one-year stay at Pau. The 34-year-old hooked up with the Top 14 club on a one-season deal following the 2019 World Cup in Japan, but he has not had the best of times, making just four league appearances (and one in the Challenge Cup) in an injury-hit campaign that was officially terminated on Thursday by French officials due to the coronavirus pandemic. 

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Prior to his switch to Pau, Waqaniburotu has spent seven productive seasons at Brive whom he had joined following his emergence in the New Zealand NPC with Waikato. He was highly regarded at Brive, their coach Jeremy Davidson stating in January 2019: “He is a player who has an aura in the group. He does not let himself down.

“He is a tough guy, a leader of men. He embodies an authority, not by his words but by his actions. After the exceptional victory at the Stade de France, nothing has changed in his behaviour. Even if there are rotations since the beginning of the season and he has not been holder (of a Brive starting jersey) all the time, we really count on him for the future.”

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RugbyPass brings you the latest edition of The Breakdown, the Sky NZ rugby programme

That faith didn’t last as no sooner did Brive secure promotion back too the Top 14 had the Fijian decided to switch clubs.

Capped 51 times by his country, Waqaniburotu had led Fiji to a historic win in Paris over France in 2018. However, hopes that this breakthrough made them a serious threat for the World Cup were misplaced as they were ambushed by minnows Uruguay in their second match at the finals and failed to progress to the quarter-finals.  

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J
JW 5 hours ago
'Let's not sugarcoat it': Former All Black's urgent call to protect eligibility rules

Yep, no one knows what will happen. Thing is I think (this is me arguing a point here not a random debate with this one) they're better off trialing it now in a controlled environment than waiting to open it up in a knee jerk style reaction to a crumbling organtization and team. They can always stop it again.


The principle idea is that why would players leave just because the door is ajar?


BBBR decides to go but is not good enough to retain the jersey after doing it. NZ no longer need to do what I suggest by paying him to get back upto speed. That is solely a concept of a body that needs to do what I call pick and stick wth players. NZR can't hold onto everyone so they have to choose their BBBRs and if that player comes back from a sabbatical under par it's a priority to get him upto speed as fast as possible because half of his competition has been let go overseas because they can't hold onto them all. Changing eligibility removes that dilemma, if a BBBR isn't playing well you can be assured that someone else is (well the idea is that you can be more assured than if you only selected from domestic players).


So if someone decides they want to go overseas, they better do it with an org than is going to help improve them, otherwise theyre still basically as ineligible as if they would have been scorning a NZ Super side that would have given them the best chance to be an All Black.

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