Kirton earns a rest

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31775, 4 September 1968, Page 13

Kirton earns a rest

VEW Zealand's leading Rugby players will be looking forward to the coming summer months for the first real rest they have had from the game for about 18 months, none more so than the All Black first fiveeighths, E. W. Kirton, who has been in action almost constantly since February, 1967.

Kirton was a member of the New Zealand Universities team which visited Hong Kong and Japan in February and March last year and he returned to New Zealand for a full domestic season. From there he was catapaulted into the All Black tour of Britain and France, during which he became the country’s leading player in his position.

After a few weeks’ rest early this year, Kirton was again plunged into the cauldron of Rugby, taking part in six charity games. Since then he has toured Australia and Fiji with the All Blacks, played in the three tests against France, and undertaken a full quota of club and representative matches in Dunedin.

His game for the South Island last Saturday was his fifty-sixth appearance in first class and charity matches during this intensive period. In these games he has scored more than 100 points, including 26 tries.

Kirton, who is 27, will play his Rugby in Dunedin again next season. A North Island product, he has played for Otago since 1960.

He is keen to further his record of nine successive test matches at first fiveeighths—a feat which not even the legendary first five-

eighths of the past, J. W. Stead and M. F. Nicholls, could achieve. The dearth of good class players in the

position at present suggests that he will retain his place against the Welsh team next winter.