Rugby's Changing Face

An excerpt from OZY -

RUGBY'S CHANGING FACE: FROM THE PRIVILEGED TO THE DOWNTRODDEN
By Tal Pinchevsky

Since its birth in early 19th-century Britain, rugby has largely remained a bastion of upper-class privilege. The sport spread across the breadth of the British Empire but remained an elite activity in most countries even after the end of colonial rule, despite occasional dents to that shell of privilege. Now, an emerging breed of young rugby players is challenging that old order more decisively than ever.

A refugee from the Ivory Coast, 21-year-old Karwhin recently joined the Redcliffe Dolphins rugby club near Brisbane, Australia, a team that in the past has given the country several national players. After living in a refugee camp along the Bosnia-Croatia border as a child, Admir Cejvanovic is now a fixture on Canada’s national team for rugby sevens — a faster, seven-a-side version of the sport. Mo Mustafa, a Palestinian refugee who settled in Britain, represented England students internationally before taking up medical studies. Italian national team player Mata Maxime Mbanda’s parents came to Italy from the Democratic Republic of Congo. Ohio-born Carlin Isles bounced around the foster care system before emerging as among the United States’ top rugby sevens players. In war-torn Benghazi, young Libyan men have formed a rugby union, and the city is building a stadium that will host Middle Eastern and North African teams in an international tournament next year. And the Tre Rose rugby club in the Italian province of Alessandria is made up almost entirely of Syrian refugees who have fled the civil war in their homeland.

http://www.ozy.com/the-huddle/rugbys-changing-face-from-the-privileged-to-the-downtrodden/82159