Athletes change their national allegiances for any number of reasons. Bernard Lagat and Meb Keflezighi are naturalized Americans who started representing the United States once they became citizens. Becky Hammon was offered the chance to play for Russia after being told she wouldn't make the U.S. team, so she took it. Same thing for Viktor Ahn, who was cut from the South Korean national team, so he moved to Russia. American snowboarder Vic Wild married his Russian girlfriend and changed his citizenship in order to continue his career after USA Snowboarding stopped funding his event.
Those reasons are all legitimate. Becky Hammon took a tremendous amount of slack for representing Russia in London, but I had no problem with her decision. She took advantage of an opportunity that she otherwise wouldn't have had. Like it or not, there was nothing that prevented her from doing that, so she did it. I view that kind of like transferring colleges. How many players leave a school after one year because they're unhappy about playing time or homesick or the coach left or whatever? How is that any different?
Hammon's not the only athlete to jump at the opportunity to be an Olympian, even if that meant representing another country. Dual citizens have their choice (and sometimes change their minds), and they have their reasons for choosing one country over the other. Sometimes it's as simple as picking the one where it'll be easier to make an Olympic team. Or maybe it's to honor a parent/grandparent. Or (like in Keflezighi's case), it's going with the country you grew up and live in over the one you were born in.
Citizenship rules vary by country, but some are very lax. For example, the Greek baseball team at the Athens Olympics consisted entirely of Greek-Americans. If you're Jewish or have a Jewish family member, you're eligible to compete for Israel. A lot of nations have rules similar to that. If you have a parent or grandparent was born in the country, you can declare your allegiance. There are a couple athletes who I've worked with who represent Ireland because of their Irish heritage. That's also why Alexi Pappas, who went to the University of Oregon, will run for Greece in Rio, and another Duck, sprinter Hannah Cunliffe, may very well be there representing Italy.
Then there are the nations that buy elite athletes, which I don't agree with. I don't even know how many, but rest assured it's a lot, native Kenyans represent nations in the Middle East. Why? Because they're not good enough to make the Kenyan team, but still world-class, so these oil-rich countries offer them citizenship and a salary with the only condition being they're now suddenly from Qatar or Bahrain instead of Kenya, even though they've possibly never even been to the country. It's a win-win for both.
While that's a highly questionable/borderline shady practice , there's no rule against it. And, again, you can understand why they do it, both the athletes and the nations involved. However, it seems to have gotten more and more prevalent in recent years. Prevalent enough for people to take notice.
IAAF President Seb Coe, who was the head of the organizing committee for the London Olympics four years ago, is one of those people who's noticed the trend, and he doesn't like it. Coe has gone on record saying that he thinks athletes should only be allowed to represent one country during their careers. Now, it's not that black-and-white (if you become a naturalized citizen of a country, you should have every right to represent the nation you voluntarily choose to live in). But his point remains a valid one.
FIFA makes you choose a country and stick with it. There are a lot set of rules regarding dual citizenship and eligibility, but, they've purposefully made it very difficult to switch national allegiances. You can change if you've never played internationally, as long as you live in the country you want to represent. And they're a little more lenient on changing nationalities moving up from the junior level to the senior level. But even then, you need to meet a certain set of requirements.
Of course, FIFA needs strict citizenship rules. Otherwise, Spain and England and Germany would naturalize every top player in La Liga and the Premier League and the Bundesliga, which would, obviously, significantly weaken world football.
It's far-fetched and ridiculous to envision that scenario in soccer, and track & field is a completely different sport. But there are parallels, and the the FIFA method is a reasonable one to draw from when coming up with rules to deal with the citizenship "problem."
I have no issue with representing one country at the youth/junior level and another at the senior level. Likewise, if you are granted citizenship in a country by whatever that nation's legal means are (it's not easy to become an American if you weren't born here), you shouldn't be prevented from representing your adopted homeland internationally. And, regarding the use of familial ties, as long as you've never competed internationally before, if you meet a country's eligibility criteria and want to represent that nation, go ahead.
Does Sebastian Coe have a point? Yes. It's certainly disturbing to see African distance runners representing every country on the globe, but I'm not sure there's much that can be done about it. The discussion is definitely a worthwhile one, though.
No comments:
Post a Comment