Sportsmen's Dinner

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30179, 10 July 1963, Page 13

Sportsmen's Dinner

COME of the greatest men in New Zealand sport, both from the past and the present, will attend a sportsmen's dinner next Monday at which the 1962 Canterbury University blues will be awarded. Including the recipients of blues, more than 300 persons are expected to attend.

Canterbury University blues were re-introduced in 1961 after a lapse of about 10 years. The standards for the blues are exacting. One of the basic requirements before an award is made is that the person nominated should be up to provincial level in his sport The main purpose of the dinner, which it is hoped will become an annual event, is to bring present university athletes in touch with men who have made their name in earlier years, and to give some standing to the award of the blues.

The blue* will be awarded by P. G. Snell, the Olympic champion athlete, and A. L. Lydiard. A. I. Cottrell, W. A Hadlee, and J. G. Leggat will speak at the dinner.

Among the other prominent sportsmen attending will be the New Zealand cricketers. M. L. Page, R. C. Motz, G. A. Bartlett, and G. T. Dowling.

Rugby will be represented by the All Blacks, P. B. Vincent, D. J. Graham, W. G. Argus, B. A Watt, and J. J. McAuliffe, a former New Zealand University representative. C. S. Thomas and C. H. Taylor, both former New Zealand half-mile champions and university champions. who will have sotnetotag in common with toe

present champion halfmiler, P. Snell, will represent athletics. Tennis will have present J. K. Burtt, who has been a prominent national administrator, and P. G. Mander, the Olympic gold medallist, will represent yachting. Ski-ing, a sport in which university students always have been prominent, will have F. C. Gillett, a former New Zealand selector, and J. F. Godfrey, who represented New Zealand Universities in 1956 and 1958. A H. Gould will attend in a dual capacity. First for rowing, in which he represented New Zealand at the Empire Games in 1950, and second for equaeh—he is president of toe Christchurch Squash Chib. N. S. Crump, an Empire Games swimming representative in 1834 and 1938, and T. Gottermeyer (soccer) will complete tbe attendance of sporting personalities. However, it will not be only the older members present who will give some lustre to the evening. Among the persons who will receive blues will be some who recently have made their names in New Zealand sport. Three All Blacks, J. N. Creighton. A J. Stewart, and R. C. Moreton, will receive blues, as well as T. H. Moynihan, B R. Smither, C. R. Hockley, D. C. Leary, Q. T. TapeeU, A F. Orme, 3. D. Pask and B. M. Weenink, who have played for Canterbury. L. Hodge, toe New Zealand champion diver, and the athletes, D. McKenzie. A. G. Steele and M. Speden are other students who have achieved national prominence in their sports.