Other successful players from the Southern Hemisphere: Flutey, van Gisberger, Stuart Abbot, Ian Jones, Craig Dowd. And the great South African second row who helped us avoid relegation. Name?
Worth noting that they were not all directly from the SH though, some like Jones, Flutey or Wentzel had a couple of seasons top flight NH experience, some like Abbot had at least some, all of which must help the transition.
Don't think anyone mentioned Nathan, oddly.
As an aside, I would be slightly surprised if the SH recruitment twenty years ago was down to the same guy it is today, of course, whoever made the original comment was probably referring to the last two years of Shields, Lima, JTA rather than Halai, Nathan et al. Btw, does anyone have any info on JTA's progress....?