Australian rugby stars Matt Giteau and Drew Mitchell have sacrificed a staggering amount of money to be at Saturday’s Rugby World Cup final.
The pair are currently contracted to three-time European champions Toulon having signed for the French outfit back in 2011 and 2013 respectively.
When they left Australia for France, it seemed as if their international careers were over due to the ARU’s policy of not picking foreign-based players.
But since Michael Cheika took over last year, the ARU have since introduced the “Giteau rule” – allowing foreign-based players to still play for the Wallabies so long as they have more than 60 caps and have spent at least seven years of their career in Australia.
Giteau and Mitchell have been welcomed back into the fray with open arms but in doing so have upset their club, who believed that they were signing two players who would not be taken away during international windows.
With the Top 14 season already underway, the Wallabies’ march to the final has left Toulon without either player, and so the pair have forgone payment for more than three months according to The Daily Telegraph in Australia.
Mitchell has apparently given up €100,000 in earnings, while Giteau has sacrificed over €160,000 as the duo agreed to go without payment for the previous 14 weeks.
Still, while it is a lot of money, we imagine their new team-mate Paul O’Connell would pay a pretty penny to be in their shoes on Saturday.
