Famous rugby coach dies in Dunedin

Press, 21 July 1980, Page 30

Famous rugby coach dies in Dunedin

PA Dunedin A former Otago rugby coach, Mr Victor George Cavanagh, died yesterday in Dunedin. He was 71. Mr Cavanagh had a lifelong association with rugby, and his reputation as a coach and authority on the game extended well beyond New Zealand. j Carwyn James, the coach of the 1971 British Lions team which toured New Zea-! land, said: “I put Vic on the same pedestal as Danie Craven, ' of South Africa. He knows more about the rudiments of the game than anyone else I have talked to.” Mr Cavanagh represented Otago at rugby in 1931, but after injury cut short his representative playing career he turned to coaching with remarkable success. His greatest results came in the 1947 to 1949 period, ; when he was coach and selector of the Otago team ' which staved off all chai- , lenges for the Ranfurly . Shield. Eleven members of 1 his 1948 team toured South < Africa with the 1949 All 1 Blacks, but, in spite of their absence, Otago retained the 1 shield that year. i

i| An able administrator, ho Hwas president of the South--'em club and the Otago i Rugby Union, as well as being a life member of both. He also served as a South , Island selector. i Mr Cavanagh initiated a j suggestion to the O.R.F.U. 1 management- committee that a code of ethics should be i introduced, and was ap- ; pointed convener of a sub- ■ I committee which set about ■ introducing the code to the • game. ■ Also a noted cricketer, Mr ■ Cavanagh represented Otago from 1927 until 1939, captaining the Plunket Shield XI on many occasions. He was twelfth man for New Zealand in the tests against Douglas Jardine’s M.C.C. team on its 1932-33 tour. In his business life, Mr Cavanagh was chairman, general manager,' and a director of the Evening Star Company, Ltd, and later, chairman and a director of Allied Press, which was taken over last year by Otago Press and Produce, Ltd. Mr Cavanagh is survived by his wife, a daughter and a son.