SOUTHLAND RUGBY TEAM

Southland Times, Issue 23921, 13 September 1939, Page 4

SOUTHLAND RUGBY TEAM

To The Editor Sir, —Attention has been drawn to an apparent omission on the part of the selectors of the Southland Rugby football team, in that only one regular hooker was included in our touring team of 23 players. It is obvious that this failure to have included an emergency hooker all but cost us the game and defeat at the hands of Auckland on Saturday. According to the report of the game published in your paper on Monday, “the loss of Southland’s only hooker (W. Sherriff) through injury had a big effect on the play of the team.” Although both F. McEwan and V. L. George, who after Sherriff’s retirement, .were tried in the “rake” position, are excellent types of forwards, they are rarely to my knowledge played in this important position even in club football and could not therefore be expected to have succeeded against such an experienced player as C. Pepper, of the Auckland team. As a result of our failure to produce a regular hooker to replace Sherriff, it is reported that our backs who saw very little of the ball from set scrums, were continually chasing their opposites, who were receiving much more than a fair share of the ball from the base of the scrum. Had our backs received even a fifty-fifty share of the ball from the scrum I venture to say that Auckland’s defeat would have been accomplished without such difficulty as was experienced. It is to be hoped, therefore, that in the future the selectors will take account of the necessity of being able to provide more than one rake forward, so that should injury necessitate the retirement of the regular hooker, the emergency who then takes the field will be capable of carrying out the duties of a rake forward with reasonable efficiency and success.—Yours, etc.,

KEEN SUPPORTER. September 12, 1939.