All Blacks Seek Record Win

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30342, 18 January 1964, Page 10

All Blacks Seek Record Win

[From A. R. VEYSEY, N.Z.P.A. Special Correspondent] PEEBLES, Jan. 16. The All Blacks face their fourth test of the series at Murrayfield tomorrow with the chances of becoming the first New Zealand team to beat all four Home Unions on the same tour. Scotland, however, will be a braw opponent. This has been well proven to the tourists, both on the field and through the Scots 10-0 victory over France a fortnight ago. They will be both sturdy and rakish in the forwards and there is a sharp edge to their midfield attack. The key to the winning of this game for New Zealand lies in the- ability to rob the Scottish loose forwards of any sense of supremacy—or even bf confidence. By basic skill, variations

of play and downright common sense the All Blacks will strive to cancel out Teller and Grant and Fisher: on its success the tourists can build the foundation of their victory. . . There is not the remotest risk in presupposing that the New Zealand forwards will do their part outstandingly well in this match. It will be a startling transformation if they do not. The backs, however, must tidy up what in the last two or three games have been quite distressingly weak passages: faulty handling, weak passing often under pressure and, in general, a rather scratchy look. The Scottish forwards will not be easily tamed. This pack will be a vastly different proposition from the almost exclusively Scottish eight which represented London Counties against the All Blacks at Twickenham. Only one of that pack remains in the international side, Bruce, the hooker. The forwards have a hard-

er, even wilder, look about them, including some of the lean leathery Borderers who did so much to set the All Blacks working on. their

wheeling and general play with the ball on the ground, whether on defence or attack. The changed men are Grant, the best all-round No. 8 the tourists have met, not as an out-and-out destroyer, but as an effective and clever scrummager and assertive runner; Hunter, an effective line-out ball winner, and Telfer, one of the tearaway type who have given Scottish Rugby much of its tradition. There is a front row of experience and strength, especially so in Rollo and Bruce. In the backs there is Wilson, a consistent goal-kicker who outplayed K: F. Scotland in the trials, and at centre, Laughland, a swift attacker. There will be a heavy weight of responsibility on Briscoe and Watt who, if the Scottish forwards get that vital early yard, which means everything to a loose forward sweeping through from the back of the line-out, must dampen their ardour by giving them not a whisp of encouragement.