http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/english/9250944.stm

The decision by the RFU not to select players to represent England if they play abroad is rather short sighted and whilst I understand their desire to have more control over the players as well as scouting issues they risk either driving some talents into retirement or prevent some players from gaining valuable experience participating in a different environment. One of the reasons I believe the national football team continue to under perform on the world stage is the lack of England footballers in foreign leagues. The more they get to play alongside or up against the real star names that play in Spain and Italy the smaller the fear factor of facing them becomes and you only have to compete against the player and not his reputation as well.
   The talk of scouting the players being an issue is an excuse as the three players mentioned (Wilkinson, Palmer and Haskell) are only in France. With Danny Cipriani it is more of an issue if he continues to ply his trade in Australia, but for the time being his game must surely be developing and if word comes back that he is playing well, presumably the selectors have TVs and could watch recordings, then it would be churlish to ignore him. Whether a ruling contravenes EU restriction of trade rules for those players in France or not is for lawyers to mull over but you can not expect professional players to turn down lucrative contracts abroad especially as English clubs only now have to competitive in salary with other English clubs. How effective this is will depend if any big names decide to emigrate - New Zealand tried something similar only to bend the rules when Dan Carter took a "sabbatical" to play for Perpignan. Such twisting would surely create more tired and injured players if they feel the need to play in the opposite hemisphere during their off season which certainly does not benefit the national side.