Again, you're falling into the trap which is peculiar to rugby discussions - everything is a binary all or nothing argument. You talk of school v club as if it's some sort of competition between the two and that only one of them can provide an elite pathway. With respect, such limited thinking is part of why rugby is in such a mess.
The example you provide actually completely demolishes your whole point - there is no way that Kurtley Beale would ever have played rugby without going to Joeys. Zero, zilch, nil, nought.
Why do you introduce a bizarre condition to your quiz that anybody who has played league is eliminated? Surely attracting kids from other sports who have never played rugby is what we should be doing? Schools provide the best way for this to occur.
Anyway, if you think it's a good thing that WA Schoolboys are sending teams to Australian Schools Championships in rugby league and WA NRL are sending teams to national club-based Australian championships but rugby is only following the club path then you are welcome to your view.
I agree with QH -it's not a binary argument - schools and clubs have a role to play in developing Rugby (and all sports), but schools in particular need to remember what they do well (and I'd argue better than clubs) and that's core fundamentals and a game for everyone each week - the introductory level - the ground floor. Once players move beyond that level their onward development is best served by the state and national body and there's bucket loads of evidence that supports this.
I eliminate Rugby League players because of the similarities of the skill set - particularly at a Junior level. But let's say that Kurtley is an example of a 100% school based sports person who never ever engaged with the sport prior to or during his time at school who then went on to National representation.
That's 1 person - in 1 sport.
1
1 only
1 example of a school only based athlete with National representation.
Surely you can't justify the school system continuing to dictate the terms of the player pathway for this age group with only 1 person as evidence from the past 30 years.
Take a look at every single national representative in any sport you care to mention and every single one of them (bar 1 maybe) learnt their craft and was provided with life long participation pathways - high performance or otherwise - from the club system.
Undoubtedly their development was complimented with the games they played at school (and most certainly they learnt lessons from school sport that you can't in club sport) and I'm not discounting schools role in developing good people. All I'm saying is that a unified pathway for Rugby is long overdue and I'm glad it now finally exists.
Having RA call the shots for the pathway doesn't diminish the good work that's done in schools - not at all. But it does acknowledge that if these are going to be he next wave of State and National rugby representatives, then they have every right to stipulate the terms of their development.
RA is to be applauded for this.
