The British Rugby Team.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 19928, 15 May 1930, Page 10

The British Rugby Team.

The British llugby footballers who arrived in Wellington yesterday are Welcome visitors, expected to make this season one of the most memorable in the history of New Zealand's international football. If none of the speakers who greeted them said anything about their mission as ambassadors, cementing cordial relationships and knitting closer ties, this was as it should bo- For the good of the game and fo* the pleasure of competition that stretches skill and sportsmanship to their highest, these exchanges of visits are so well worth making that it is a pity to look for remoter reasons, which sometimes sound a little ridiculous and sometimes are. The British love of sport richly and easily justifies itself, and it is most healthy when its leaders no more look outside the fun and the rigour of the game for excuses than the tribe Of small boys at play think of the value of exercise. We cannot have a visiting football team on our fields every season; but when we are so fortunate as to have one, we take the game, not too seriously, but just seriously enough (and just lightly enough) if it is our single wish to see it played hard and fairly and at its to win or lose without the help ot hindrance p£ accident, and to quicken in the young" learners the delight and the desire to excel in it. If the Dominion is keen to win, this is its warmest compliment to the visitors. They are worth beating, and will not be easy to beat.