RUGBY FOOTBALL.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 23 June 1923, Page 3

RUGBY FOOTBALL.

The second round commenced Ws-t •Saturday, but not a great deal «f interest was taken in the matches. The ■day was fine, and. consequently quite a large number of enthusiasts travelled to tMe various centres. Eltham had a iye, and therefore numbers of Eltham people tripped to Kaponga t© see the jclash. between that team and t"he leaders. The play generally was pretty scrappy, with only occasionally flashes ■«f good work. Kaponga are "a young team, and appear as though with coaching they could develop) into a useful combination. They have several speedy lacks, and their forwards .have any amount of dash, but a lot of it is ill directed. They -gave the dhampions a 3500 d run, and had hard luck in not on several occasions. With a little luck they would have made the -result closer even than it was. They -crossed the line once, and Ike placed ••* very fine goal at a distance at which, with a heayy ground and a more or less :heavy ball, spectators hardly gave "him a chance. It was a very fine effort. <©kaiawa, however, did not play up to b«st form. The Hawera-Waimate ima-tch was ■mostly a tussle between the opposing •forwards, and consequently was not Wylie "kept up his, consistently good form by scoring a nice Ary, while Milton Bailey, pressed into service, showed his pace on several occasions, getting across the line twice. l^ Hawera place-kickers, were not on the ■job, and not one of five tries was converted. Hughes, for Manala, showed %is consistent kicking by converting ■Jt>ne and just failing to convert another. Junior football is very interesting at iiliis -end, and a number of really good snatches have been seen at Hawera. The local team is one of the best they fiave had, and under the guidance and «oaching of Mr. G. Villars are showing -^capital form. They are in a very good position in the championship, and if "they keep up the form they Lave shown Will take a lot of stopping. One of 'the brightest spots in South ■"Taranaki football this year, as it was -during the last year or two, is the •chool football. *A very large number •of teams have rbeen playing in the *Teas into which the district is divided, aand much capital 'form has been shown. . Thanks to an energetic and enthusiastic tx»dy of 'headmasters, the interest has "been well maintained. On Wednesday a trial A v. B match was nlayed, and to-day rep. teams selected from these areas were selected to meet, and from them will be picked the team to play against the selected of "Xorth Taranaki. Never before has such keen interest in school football been seen, -and it is good to know that this is so, fov from these •Iwys will come the reps, of the future. In Dunedin footoa'll TJnivemty A are deposed from the proud position they field at the top of the senior champion«hip, and are one point below Kaikorai, -whose team have a distinguished reoord behind them. 'Varsity A rattled rap 31 points against Dunedin, and their B team put on 33 points against Union^ while Kaikorai went better jstiil and beat Taieri by 51 to nil. They anust have spent a good deal of their fame scoring and kicking at goal. j The Maoris in Australia have so far shown good form, but in the first Test -tWre defeated by a small margin. It is regrettable to read the report of rough ptay, which, according to the cables, was the more marketi on their part. It is a bad notice for Jfew Zealand foot-

} Nothling, the great Australian and 'Varsity three*quarter> as well as allround athlete, was apparently in goalkicking form, for h« converted three penalties. One of the Maori team kicked four goals, and another of the New South Welshmen three. It is very unusual .to see so many kicked in one match. ".This act, expressing your unions gratitude of the good work done by coaches, is, my committee considers, a highly commendable one, and we beg to record our appreciation of youx committee's thoughtfulness." In that manner the Marist Rugby Fastball Club expressed its appreciation «>f the Wellington Rugby Union's action in supplying the coaches with season "tickets. This is only a slight tribute to the voluntary work of men who are doing a great deal for football, and ; mostly doing it out of the limelight and often without any acknowledgment. Tn Hawera and South Taranaiki districts generally there are a number doing ;£his good work, -and. especially amongst the junior teams "is it moet valuable. I The good results can "hardly he over- ! estimated. J There are in Hawera and district ! many friends of H. T. Wilkinson, the brilliant wing three-quarter of last year's Hawera taain and same of the rep. teams, and admirers of his i?iay and his unassuming personality. It •will be welcome news to -them to lc-arn j that, writing from the sTmatoriain at Waipukurau, he says: "I am progressing slowly—still it is progress, a?t J f lam quite contented." All will hope that he will soon be restored to good ■ health. I Nothling. the New South Wales wing j three-quarter, wi'io is well knowi to | New Zealanders, is probably the finest all-round amateur athlete in iNew South Wales. Last year, in Bydrey premiership cricket, he topped the bc/w i- j j ing averages with 12.78. bis tally !-.*-:ng ! |46 wickets. He has played for New! South Wales and 'Varsity at Rugby.! ; and New South Wales at cricket, and j | won championships at javelin-throwing ! and shot-putt. He- came from Queens- i land to Sydney .'Varsity. The French sporting papers are not i sparing in their comments on the- recent j Kugby Cup se.m.i-final match between; Toulouse and Biarritz, which is de- j scribed, by one Journal as an "example of street fighting.'' The referee ordered four players off the field, and three retired hurt, Biarritz ending the j game with a team of eleven, and Tou-1 louse with a team of thirteen. An; equal share of blame is given to both! teams. "It is time that the directors ,of French Rugby consider energetic j '. measures to prevent such grave incij dents," writes the "Aucq.'> "To post- ! pone any longer the application of penalties would constitute a- very grave menace to Rugby football/ i The piling up of what are termed j the cricket scores of Rugby, seems to: be the happy lot of the teams competing |n the lower grades, On Saturday last the Petone A fourth clxss team notched the imposing total of 65 points, while their opponents, Jo%nsonville, failed to cross the line. Some years ago a Petone fifth class team, which by the way was captained by "Doc Nicholls. rattled on the useful score of 101. The gume was against' Old Boys, who succeeded in scoring only, three points. Other outstanding scores in the week-end were as follow: Fourth class: Marist. 56; Selwyn 0 Old Boys 49; Wellington 80. Afchlevc 41; Wellington College 0. Poneke 35; Hutt 3. Sixth class f Wellington College C 60, Athletic 0; Wellington College A 57. Berhampore, 0; Wellington College C 36, Hutt 0. Seventh class: Scots College 63, Institute C 0. ■•I - i i i i -p.

Of an Athletic player in the team. ( which plumed a buijpnse but a merited' victory over Mariais in Wellington a, fortnight ago a New Zealand Times writer stated; "If sill the youthful wingforwards in Wellington could have as-, s^mbied at the Athletic .Park on teatur- ' day they would have learnt & lesson. The transfer of Porter from five-eighths to wing-forward has given him a position to which he is ideally fitted. Essentially an individualist, rather too much given to kicking, speedy and solid, Porter more than filied the bill, j As one plivyer in a senior match next. door to the Ath.letic-Mar.ist contest remarked, iie played a back game. Porter, on Saturday, showed what the . veteran Stead meant when he remarked ! i at the last meeting of the New Zealand Rugby Unioai apiopos of the wing for-, ward: "fife's not a wing-forward at all,; ■he's aHy half.1' Unfortunately, the.: ' tradition "has been lost. The winger to- j day is trained as a- forward, taught a: forward'B work, nineteen times in' twenty, gets the idea that his primary; duty is to protect a half, who ought; 'to be quii.k unoughto protect himself.! ! Thus the absfcructionist game com--1 menced. iiut the wing-forward should | i not only be a spoiler, lie should be oap-' { able of opening irp the game, and that !is what Porter did. He was not once ! on the same side of the scrum as Connon, the Marist winger, yet Warwick ; did not suffer. And he smothered McLeary when necessary without suspicion •of being off-side. The moral of it all ! is: if you want a winn forward, get !.« iive-eiijhth. who is an individualist. '; Athletics have abolished the title of j w'jig forward in 3*orter's case and sub- ! stituted for it that o-f "fly-half." There i:s amn'e in the remarks which Hawera ! c.l libs can extract and apply in a beneficial manner. j 11 I