The Auckland Star WITH WHICH AND INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, The Echo and The Sun. SATURDAY, OCTOBER 24, 1936. LOOKING AHEAD IN RUGBY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 253, 24 October 1936, Page 8

The Auckland Star WITH WHICH AND INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, The Echo and The Sun.

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 24, 1936. LOOKING AHEAD IN RUGBY.

For the cause that lacks assistance, For the icrong that needs resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that tee can do.

Visits to New Zealand by teams from lands beyond Australia are rare, and they :-\vould be rarer still were it not that it is possible fairly often for such teams to play a few matches in the Dominion on their way to or from their major engagements in the Commonwealth. Practically only in Rugby is the athletic prowess of New Zealarders so great that teams will travel thousands of miles with the main purpose of trying conclusions with the wearers of the All Black jersey, and only incidentally with the Australians. Of such Rugby teams there have been four, including three from England, but a second South African team is even now being selected for a tour next season. Though summer and autumn must pass before that team lands in New Zealand, the legion of Rugby followers, and especially those who remember the Springboks of 1921, are alieady looking forward to the tour with keen anticipation, and lately they have noted with interest the appointment, in Mr. Percy W. Day, of a manager who, having been closely associated with the New Zealand Army team in 1919, has already expressed himself as a warm admirer of New Zealand sportsmanship. The Springboks of 1921 made a deep impression in New Zealand. The size of a few of their forwards, of whom "Baby" Michau was the most bulky, surprised even New Zealanders, who are accustomed to seeing giants in the scrum and line-out. They had few individual "stars" (with Gerhard Morkel, the full-back, perhaps the outstanding exception), but their team work was admirable. Their attacking methods were English orthodox, designed to the one end that their wing three-quarters,, including the spectacular van Heerden, should have a "run in." There was in some of their attacks, launched usually from the scrum, when within striking distance, an irresistible, machine-like precision, beautiful to watch. Their forward play was dour and unrelenting. Their defence, especially after they had played a few games, was extraordinarily strong. Frequently opposing teams found that they V ' could do "everything but score." In the final Test, a match that will not be forgotten in New Zealand for generations, their rock-like defence was matched, but neither side could seoi-e, and the tour ended with Test honours even, Athletic Park a sea of mud, and thousands of spectators wetter than they had ever been in their lives. As the South African team must leave very early next season, its personnel may have to be chosen this year. Already some players have been unofficially named as "certainties," and estimates are available of the probable quality of the team. Like its predecessor, it will be strong in the forwards, and another fine full-back has been found. But, just as New Zealand has no inside back of the quality of a Mark Nicliolls or a Cooke, South Africa has found none to replace "Bennie" Osier, a fact which is perhaps fortunate from the New Zealand point of view. It must be remembered, however, that although the All Blacks who went to South Africa were given (in New Zealand) a reputation as the "best ever," the Springboks were regarded, by South Africans, as "comparatively weak." Any South African team, wlieit it has 'acquired combination, is likely to bfi formidable. As to the quality of its opponents next season opinions differ, but the record of recent seasons does not inspire unbounded confidence in the standard of New Zealand Rugby to-day. There is no doubting that the New Zealanders, in hospitality, and the players, in sportsmanship, will justify the eulogies of the Springboks in 1921, byt the Rugby follower, admitting these as the first essentials, wants more; he wants a team built up that will be comparable with the best "All Black" teams of the past.