REMARKABLE TEAM

Manawatu Standard, Volume LV, Issue 158, 4 June 1935, Page 6

REMARKABLE TEAM

TOKORANGI SCHOOL PLAYERS. A STERLING PERFORMANCE. There are fifteen boys attending the Tokorangi School, the educational centre tor a small settlement in the Feilding-Marton district. Of these there are only nine pupils from standards 3 to 6, and from this ludicrously small number seven were selected to form a team wliich took part in the primary schools’ division of the Manawatu Rugby Union s seven-a-side tournament at the Showgrounds yesterday. These seven boys are taught in the one room by Mr M. C. Amadio, who is the wing-threequarter of the Fending Old Boys team which annexed the honours in the senior competition at the tournament. Under his coaching they have developed into a combination whose fast passing game was a miniature of that of the senior team in which their teacher plays. Mustering their thin ranks, the team came to Palmerston North with no advance reputation, and it was indeed as “dark horses’’ that they took the field to compete against thirteen other primary school teams, whose representatives were chosen from a much wider range of players. Little attention was paid to the team as they filed out for its first match with four of the players bootless, three of them being Maori pupils. Meeting Marist in the second round after having received the bye in the first, it was expected that the modestcountry team would soon be vanquished, but amazement turned to admiration when, with approved Rugby tactics, they clapped on sufficient points to win comfortably. Convent School were eliminated with ease in the semifinal, and in the final the gallant little Tokorangi players capped a sterling performance by brilliantly defeating Manchester Street (Feilding), last year’s champions being severely trounced. The Tokorangi team scored 47 points in three games, and had only 6 recorded against them. Two Maori boys, Keri and Simmons, made the spearhead of a powerful attack, and, once they got clear, were able to outstrip any opposition. Both showed the potentialities of great footballers, the former with clever deception, and the latter with an unusual turn of speed and strong fend for his fourteen years. Their exhibition won the warmest approbation of the crowd. The Tokorangi School’s septette have placed their little district on the local Rugby map and established for themselves a new prestige.