Lions’ star shines again after fine display

Press, 4 August 1977, Page 32

Lions’ star shines again after fine display

By

PAUL CAVANAGH,

NZPA staff correspondent

Pukekohe The British Lions had too much power up front and too much speed and guile in the backs as they strolled to a 35-10 win over a disappointing Counties-Thames Valley combination at Pukekohe yesterday.

The Lions scored five tries and the Combined team two, and that was a fair indication of the difference between the two sides. The Lions dominated the set play through their big strong pack, and although the Counties and Thames Valley men were extremely diligent on defence in the early stages of the match, they fell apart as the game I progressed. The Lions had a match-1 winner in the little Scottish I half-back. Doug Morgan,' who will be in for plenty of work in the remaining I matches of the tour after, the injury to Brynmor Wil-i liarns, the test man.

Morgan was in superb form yesterday, and the Lions could only shake their Heads in sad memory of the lost opportunities in Saturday’s test as he was successful with six kicks — none of them easy — from nine attempts. Morgan also picked up a try after a fine piece of forward control by the Lions had carried the scrum right to the combined’ team’s line. He was on hand! to score the try after Jeff Squire had missed the ball; as the scrum crossed the; line.

Morgan thus contributed 19 points to his side’s victory, and the Lions’ manager Mr George Burrell, a Scotsman, could have been forgiven a smile of satisfaction in the knowledge that Morgan and the fullback, Bruce Hay, with two fine tries, contributed 27 of the Lions’ points.

The other two tries came in the last four minutes of the match from the Newport left winger. Gareth Evans, but they were little consolation for a generally poor showing by the test winger. Fay, in fact, might well

have scored Evans’s first tryp himself, to give him the hat- ' trick, but he unselfishly;!

made the final pass to Evans, perhaps in an effort to boost the Welshman’s confidence. Hay was the first to pat Evans on the back I and congratulate him iwarmly on what was a i straightforward try. I The disappointment of the game was the poor standard of the home team. Just before the game counties officials spoke confidently of what improvements were planned for the Pukekohe Stadium complex when their side lifted the Ranfurlyl Shield from Manawatu later this month.

: Tut the improvements will be a long time coming if the [form displayed today is not sharply improved.

Two Thames Valley players were introduced into the back-line, which obviously had an unsettling effect on the Counties’ combination, but there was a general lethargy about the backs which was a great disappointment to the estimated crowd of 25,000. I Bruce Robertson, the All | Black centre who played such ,a dazzling part in the AH , Blacks’ third-test victory last Saturday, seemed almost disinterested in proceedings yesterday, which was perhaps understandable after the "high” of Carisbrook. He took a hard knock early, which might have worried him after his recent concussion, but the medical report afterward cleared him of any injury. The only injuries in the match were suffered by the combined half-back, Mark Codlin, who had to leave the field just before the end when the muscles under his arm, damaged in a club match on Saturday, gave him further

I trouble. He was replaced by Thames Valley’s P. J. “Tuck” Sheehan.

! Squire was taken for a (precautionary x-ray to his chest bone after the match, but the doctor who attended him said that he was confident there was no serious damage. Once again the basis for the British win was laid in the forwards, where Allan Martin and Moss Keane dominated the lineouts, and where the Pontypool front row ensured a strong and solid scrum. Martin and Keane gave the Lions a 21-10 advantage at the lineouts, and although the

Lions had a much more slender advantage in the set scrums and actually lost the tight-head count, 3-2, the ball

fed back to Codlin was often so hurried that he had no chance of controlling it. The British loose forwards were not so evident although Trevor Evans got through plenty of work at the mauls. Charlie Faulkner came through his first match since joining the tour well, and he had an interesting tussle with John Huges, the counties’ tight-head man. John Spiers, an All Black in the Argentine last year, gave the Lions test man Graham Price plenty to think about, and Counties are well served by such a strong and talented front row. Morgan, of course, was the outstanding back on the field, but there were nice touches too from John Bevan, Mike Gibson, and Hay. The Morgan-Bevan combination was sound, Gibson did some things with all the old flair, and Hay proved once again to be a reliable full-back. He chose to spend more time in the back-line than

might have been wise, for he was caught badly when 1 Don McMillan, the Thames Valley right-winger, picked up a kick through by Bevan and found himself in the clear, but inside his own 22m area. He set sail on an angled run to the distant corner of the ground and it was perhaps a sign of the advancing Gibson years that the Irishman could not peg him back. Both were at the point of exhaustion by the time the run had ended, but the combined man. who till then had not shown much of a turn of pace, still had a yard 1 or two to spare on Gibson. Sensational as the runaway try was, it was not all the crowd had to interest it, for a fight among Bevan and two forwards from each side was under way as the referee, Mr Peter McDavitt, raced away with a tryscorer.

Price, Martin, Joe Rawiri, and Alan Dawson were the offending players, but they broke things up themselves as the try was scored. The Counties skipper, Andy Dalton, was spoken to sternly by Mr McDavitt after the forwards had wrestled amonst themselves on the ground after a scrum, and a fiery flanker, Hank Habraken, was lucky to escape more serious condemnation when he shrugged Mr McDavitt away as the referee talked to him after awarding a penalty to the Lions.

The Lions led 12-0 at halftime.

Scorers. — British Isles: Gareth Evans, Bruce Hay (2) and Doug Morgan tries, Morgan three penalties and three conversions. Counties/Thames Valley: Don McMillan and Bob Lendrum tries, Lendrum a conversion.