SPRINGBOKS IN HOME GAMES

Press, Volume XCIV, Issue 28099, 15 October 1956, Page 18

SPRINGBOKS IN HOME GAMES

RUGBY FOOTBALL

40,000 SEE FESTIVAL MATCHES

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) (Rec. 7 p.m.) JOHANNESBURG, Oct. 13. A crowd of 40,000 gathered at Ellis Park in Johannesburg to welcome back the 195 b South African Rugby players when they played two festival matches, against invitation teams, in conditions vastly different from what they had encountered in New Zealand—hot summer weather, with a crowd sweltering in shirt sleeves, and a hard, dry ground. In two brilliant spells of devastating attack, reminiscent of their display against the Maoris, a Springbok team had a decisive win against an invitation side by 27 points to 15. The Springboks were 11 points up in the first 17 minutes, but then tired, and after leading 11-3 at half-time found themselves trailing 11-15 within 11 minutes of the resumption. In the last 11 minutes they shook off the staleness, understandable after an unusually early series of trial matches followed by an arduous tour, to run up 16 points and win handsomely. In the early match, a Springbok team which was brought up to strength by five former Springboks and Bill Cunningham, the Eastern Province flanker who nearly gained selection for the New Zealand tour, played lethargic, disinterested Rugby, and the invitation B side had little difficulty in beating them soundly by 29 points, after leading 13-3 at half-time. Of the nine tourists in the Springbok side three could not have been expected to take the field under normal circumstances.

For Tommy Gentles it was the first game since he dislocated his shoulder at Rotorua six and a half weeks ago. It was Wilf Rosenberg’s first outing since he pulled a hamstring muscle against New Zealand Universities, and James Starke had just arrived back in South Africa after a sea voyage from Australia lasting nearly five weeks. The over-all impression of the main game was that the Springboks played with such purposefulness and polish in the first few, and the final minutes, that 80 minutes of such football would have left the strong invitation team a badly beaten

The manner in which they achieved victory must have given the crowd an indication of the strength of New Zealand Rugby to have won this year’s international series, and at the same time answered those- who alleged that the strongest available side had not been chosen for the tour.