HAEREMAI!

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 9, 1 April 1927, Page 12

HAEREMAI!

“W ATT! E” BARCLAY, CAP- | TAIN OF N.Z. MAORI j TEAM, MAY SETTLE IN j j AUCKLAND A NOTABLE CAREER Enlisted at 16. Awarded the Military Medal. A commissioned officer while still in his “teens.” This, in brief, is the military record of “Wattie” Barclay, captain of the Maori football team, who is at present in Auckland. All going well in the meantime, he proposes to settle here. He will be a notable addition to Auckland Rugby. First of all lie didn’t want to see a reporter. And when he did see one,

much against his will, he didn’t want to talk. But it is a newspaperman’s job to ferret out these details, and, fortunatley, a fairly close acquaintance with his career helped a lot in extracting the information. “Wattie,” as he is known to his friends, was educated at St. John’s College, Auckland, and he was; still at school when war broke out. He left school to enlist. Of his military career enough has been said to indicate that it was not without merit. Hawke’s Bay claimed him when the “Big Strafe” was over. He soon became one of the outstanding Rugby Players of the meat and wool province. l Trips to Australia in 1922 and 1923 with the Maori team established, his reputation as one of the finest scoring three-quarters in the Dominion. A broken leg at Invercargill late in 1923 (writer remembers the match well) settled his chances of going Home with the 1924 All Blacks. Some thought he was finished as a footballer. But 1925 found him on deck again, fit and well as ever. In the following year, when it was decided to accept an invitation from France for a Maori team to show the excitable Gauls how the game is played in Nouvelle Zealande, Barclay was quickly marked out for the position of captain. He proved himself as good a leader on the football field as he was in the trenches. The Maoris had an excellent record, taken all in all; they were popular everywhere, and Barclay, as captain, not only handled his men well but was one of the outstanding players of the tour. Barclay has relations here, and he wants to settle in Auckland. If he stays he should prove a welcome addition to Auckland football.