History Of Rugby Hazy

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31088, 17 June 1966, Page 37 (Supplement)

History Of Rugby Hazy

Football did not have as early a beginning in Canterbury as did cricket, but it was being played a few years after the pilgrims arrived, Christ’s College boys being the main players. “It is very difficult to find out really when football was first played in the province,” writes W. G. Garrard in “Fifty Years History of the Canterbury Rugby Football Union.” “Some of the early settlers in letters and public statements made reference to the game being played, but the whole idea in those early games was to have a general kick at a piece of leather, get together for something like a social talk, and indulge in an afternoon’s fun.” According to Garrard, one

of the earliest references to the game was by C. T. Dudley, who in 1853 walked over from Lyttelton to attend Christ’s College, carrying his clothes in a swag. He wrote: “Footballs were first made of bullock's bladders covered over with leather.” The first games he could remember were played on the east side of Rolleston avenue, opposite Christ’s College, in a paddock known as Raven’s paddock. , Football was played at Christ’s College long before recognised rules were drawn

up. The first recorded match, however, was played between Christchurch and Lyttelton at Charteris Bay in 1862, when Charles Ollivier was captain of the Christchurch side. The real beginnings of football in Canterbury can be dated from 1862. The arch of the Lyttelton tunnel was fixed on September 29, 1862, and a report said: “After the banquet an indiscriminate game of football was played by the citizens of Christchurch and Lyttelton in which the citizens measured their lengths on the grass.”