RUGBY SEASON

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19483, 6 May 1933, Page 15

RUGBY SEASON

OPENING GAMES TO-DAY

Items of Interest

The Rugby season in South Canterbury will commence to-day when matches will be played in all grades.

N. A. McKenzie, selector to the Hawke's Bay Rugby Union for many years, and for some seasons a New Zealand selector, has been elected the first life-member of the Napier Amateur Athletic and Cycling Club. Mr. McKenzie started the club seven years ago. and has been the driving power behind its great run of success since then.

The Australian Rugby Union authorities have been informed that Japan is anxious for a tour of an Australian University team in 1934. The tourists will have to pay their own expenses, although £4OO will be* given to assist in this direction. The visitors will also receive 75 per cent of the gate receipts, so that there is every likelihood of the tour being held.

George Nepia, the famous Maori fullback in the 1924 All Black team is working hard on his farm at Wairoa. People who have inspected properties in that locality of late declare that the Rugby champion has his farm looking in splendid order. Nepia intends playing again this season and is reported to have stated his intention of keeping fit in view of the next tour to Great Britain three years hence.

Some advice to hookers and referees was given at the Rugby referees’ conference by Mr. W. J. Wallace, who was present for a time by invitation.

Quoting from the experience of last year's All Black team in Australia, he demonstrated a valuable and simple method of hooking under this rule. He showed that if the middle hooker stood astride he had to hook with his far foot around the other leg—an awkward and slow method, besides which the opening into the second row was restricted, If, however, the middle hooker placed his near side foot, the third foot in the scrummage, immedl--ately behind his hooking or fourth foot, he had a clear hook and a bigger gap to put the ball through. This was admitted by the conference as a legitimate practice. Replying to a query, Mr. Wallace commented that there was no counter to the method, but its success simply depended on the cleverness and speed of the hooker.

As cricket has proved popular in the West Indies, so has Rugby gained a footing among the native races in the South Pacific Islands, and one of the first entertainments provided for Lord and Lady Bledisloe on their arrival at Samoa was a Rugby match, Lord Bledisloe later stating that he hoped satisfactory arrangements would be made for a Samoan team to tour New Zealand. Another outpost of the Empire which has ambitions towards exchanging tours with New Zealand is Fiji, where the chairman of the Rugby Union is Mr. Jack Taylor, well known in Wellington as a player, coach, and administrator.

At its meeting last week the management committee of the Wellington Rugby Union, on the score of expense, regretfully turned down an invitation from Fiji for a Wellington team to visit there this season, but it was decided this week to seek the co-opera-tion of the New Zealand Union, and it is possible that something may yet be done.

The matter was reopened by the reading of a covering letter from Mr. Taylor to Mr. Prendeville in which the writer stated there had been a decided improvement in the standard of play during the past one or two '•seasons, and Fiji could now place in the field a team which, with a little experience against outside teams, could give a good account of itself. A visit from a New Zealand team would give the game a decided boost, and it was Fiji’s ambition to send to New Zealand a native team which, it was considered, would prove a decided attraction. He suggested that a Wellington Colts' team, with one or two experienced players, should leave Auckland in September by one San Francisco mail steamer and return by the next, a fortnight later. Arriving on a Friday, it could play against a second fifteen on the Saturday, and Test matches on the following Wednesday, Saturday, and Wednesday. Mr Prendeville suggested that the matter might de discussed informally by the New Zealand Union delegates prior to the commencement of the annual meeting, and an arrangement reached similar to that by which a Wellington team was sent to the West Coast last season. Possibly a team could be organised on a voluntary basis, the members to contribute something towards the expenses. The secretary (Mr. A. E. Neilson), estimated that the tour would co t at least £320. The trip by rail to Auckland and back was a big item.