West opposes league tour plan

Press, 18 February 1986, Page 25

West opposes league tour plan

PA Auckland Wigan’s rugby league captain, Graeme West, does not favour a club proposal to tour Australia and New Zealand at the end of the British season. But the former Kiwi captain admits the decision to tour ultimately rests with club directors, who are pushing heavily for a three-match southern tour.

Wigan proposes to play a New Zealand XIII in Auckland on May 25, and the top Australian club sides, Wynnum-Manly and Parramatta, the week after.

West said from his Wigan home that the proposed visit was timed too soon after the end of the English season.

“The directors are already talking as though it's definitely going to go ahead,” West said. “I’m not so sure. It’s just too soon.”

The British season ends on Saturday, May 17, with the premiership final, a match the star-studded Wigan side is favoured to contest.

West believes a trip to the other side of the world the week after, with games against three top

sides, would be too much to ask of his players. “The problem is by that time of the year, we’re probably going to be playing three games a week. We’ve had four games postponed just recently because of the snow, and they probably won’t get played until right near the end of the season,” said West.

“We’re having the problem now also that we’re losing a lot of guys to the Great Britain squad, and are having to ask for dispensations.” Few clubs can compare with the international experience

available to West’s Wigan team.

Quite apart from the British internationals, Ellery Hanley, Joe Lydon, Andy Goodway, Shaun. Edwards, Mike Ford, lan Potter, Brian Case and Shaun Wane, it has two Australians, Steve Ella and Greg Dowling, the Kiwi, West, and three South Africans, Ray Mordt, Rob Louw and Nicky du Toit.

If a tour to Australasia did eventuate, all except the Australians, Dowling and Ella, would be travelling.

“At least they’re looking at doing it properly,” West said. “They want to bring the best team over. Not like Hull a couple of years ago, which left some of its best players behind.

“But I’m still not convinced it’s a good idea for the players, even though it will probably be tremendous for the game over there.”