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The Ecstasy and the Agony: The Brief History of Cyprus Rugby

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The team with the most consecutive victories in the history of international rugby union is not, as you might suppose, New Zealand or South Africa both have recorded 17 straight wins, the joint-second longest winning streaks. Instead, amidst the exhilaration of that world record-breaking sequence, the Cyprus Rugby Federation CRF would receive the heartbreaking news that the International Rugby Board IRB had rejected their application for membership and thus denied them access to the World Cup Qualifiers. A dispersed group of largely amateur players who had been part-financing their flights to play international rugby for the land of their fathers would have their dreams choked by the tautest of red tape. The arrival of international rugby on Cyprus was a happy by-product of an unhappy history a singular history that the IRB singularly failed to give due consideration. However, after 14 years of distinctly uneasy power-sharing and increasing strife between the Greek-Cypriot and Turkish-Cypriot communities, all played out against the Byzantine intrigues of the Cold War, the fragile democracy was shattered. On 15 July an Athens-sponsored coup by Greek-Cypriot paramilitaries calling for enosis union with Mother Greece ousted the president, Archbishop Makarios. Five days later, Turkey retaliated by invading and, during a short but bloody conflict, occupied the northern third of the island until a truce was brokered on July As well as the huge internal displacement — Greek Cypriots living in the north frantically fleeing south, Turkish Cypriots making the opposite journey — large numbers of the islanders, proficient English speakers through compulsory schooling, emigrated to the Anglophone lands of the United Kingdom, South Africa and Australia, where they would eventually pick up a love of rugby. Its walls are adorned with signed, framed shirts from a multitude of famous clubs and half-a-dozen TV screens showing whatever union is on offer from around the world. The CRF is entirely voluntary, and only four of the players are professionals. They arrived for their first game at the Akrotiri army base without any kit, borrowed some, proceeded to win and were quickly added to the four-team Joint Services RFU garrison league; they finished joint-top in their first season, outright winners the next. Cypriot rugby had taken its first tentative steps. In time, Limassol Crusaders and Nicosia Barbarians would be added, forming a seven-team domestic league under the auspices of the CRF, which was established in , with the national team notching an inaugural win over Greece in March in front of 2, supporters. However, the very afternoon that the Bulgarians were being overwhelmed, Cyprus was plunged into a financial crisis that, for a couple of weeks, made it global headline news. After the ecstasy came the agony. By the time the Moufflons had won their next game, claiming the world record outright in Hungary the following April, their federation were forced to break the bad news: there would be no World Cup qualification process. But no: at the moment of glory, the hour of peak publicity for this emerging sport, the IRB decision would not only snuff out the innocent sporting hopes of the Cypriot rugby team — players who had been travelling back from France, the British Isles, Holland, even Singapore — but also, in conjunction with the financial crisis, rob Cyprus of a never-to-be-repeated window of opportunity to accelerate rugby development on the island. It was already difficult enough to entice back the likes of Chris Dicomidis, the ex-Pontypridd skipper now playing Pro12 with Cardiff Blues, as well as full-time professionals in Scotland, France and Ireland. Yet players of Cypriot heritage had been identified in top-level domestic rugby in Australia and South Africa — the likes of Demetri Catrakilis, then of Southern Kings, now at Montpellier — players who might have fancied a tilt at a World Cup qualifying campaign. Overnight, the Cypriot rugby fairytale had, it seemed, gone from Cool Runnings to Catch : they needed to expand their infrastructure in order to attain IRB membership, yet needed IRB membership and the pull of World Cup qualification matches to raise their profile and sponsorship revenues, so as to improve that development infrastructure… It was like chasing a grubber kick upfield only for an erratic bounce to induce a knock-on in sight of the try line. In actual fact, there is a degree of flexibility permitted on this issue for countries with populations under 1. And this is where things get complicated…. At the time, Cyprus in fact had a seven-team XV-a-side league adding an eighth team, in Larnaca, in early As far as IRB are concerned, they were foreign teams. The main barrier to incorporating one or all of the Army and RAF teams under the CRF aegis was financial: specifically, the Serious Injury and Death insurance cover that works out significantly cheaper for the RFU, who can spread the risk across a large number of registered players, than for the CRF, with its already stretched resources. It was all highly frustrating. To a certain extent, the Membership and Pathway Criteria are important safeguards against the cultivation of Petri-dish teams laden with imported players fast-tracked through citizenship in order to artificially bolster a national XV. It is there to ensure the authentic establishment of a rugby culture. Born and raised in Limassol, he first picked up a rugby ball aged 17 and after a year with the Academy found himself fast-tracked to the national side, making his debut against Slovenia in Paphos on his 18th birthday. When asked what it would mean to represent Cyprus in the World Cup, Efthymiou simply broke out in goosebumps, speechless. In that simple, involuntary physiological reaction lay the truth of Cypriot rugby development. If Greece could be granted provisional Full Membership owing to its financial crisis which turned out not to be quite so unique and conditional upon making short-term improvements, why not Cyprus, with its genuinely unique uniqueness, thus allowing them to play the RWCQs? The irony of all this administrative inconsistency is not lost on Kirby, who was working in Greece in when an IRB delegation visited with a view to establishing a federation in the lead-up to the Athens Olympics, where they hoped rugby union would be a demonstration sport. Yet the IRB delegation arrived sure Greece was running a team league, and had the documentation to prove it. As it turned out, a Greek PhD student in Bulgaria had concocted the whole thing. It was a paper league, a bureaucratic mirage. The IRB, it seemed, was somewhat less rigorous back then. There were huge potential socio-political ramifications for the increased profile of the Moufflons on the island in the wake of their success, for they were, in , the only Cypriot national team in which Turkish Cypriots played alongside Greek Cypriots. You only had to witness them belting out the Cypriot national anthem, however, to see their palpable commitment to the Moufflons. Truly inspirational. Of all sportsmen, rugby players should perhaps be most inoculated against the fates, given that the course of matches, seasons, careers, even an entire life can hang on the capricious bounce of their odd-shaped ball. By Zac Larkham. By Kyle MacNeill. By Greg Walters. By Maxwell Strachan. Share: X Facebook Share Copied to clipboard. Videos by VICE. Tagged: burhan torgut , chris dicomidis , cypriot rugby , cyprus , dervis devren , fidias efthymiou , paul shanks , rugby , rugby world cup , Sports , the moufflons , theo lenos , VICE Sports.

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