Frederic P Miller

Dual-code Rugby Internationals Frederic P Miller

Publisher Marketing: Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. A dual-code rugby international is a rugby footballer who has represented a country (or more rarely, two countries) at the international level in both rugby union and rugby league. Rugby league started as a breakaway version of rugby union in Northern England (1895) and in New Zealand and Australia in 1908 and consequently a number of the top-class rugby league pioneers had been star players in the rugby union code. Not surprisingly, a high proportion of Australia and New Zealand's dual-code rugby internationals played in rugby league's formative years in those countries. From 1910 through to 1995, dual-code internationals were infrequent and without exception the player had first appeared as a union international before shifting to league. In 1995 rugby union itself turned professional and the tide of switches began to reverse. Since then generally all cross-code representatives have debuted internationally in league before being lured to union where a truly international competitive arena and freedom from rugby league's salary cap constraints (at least in Australia) have offered an attractive career alternative.