THE FOOTBALL FIELD.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 7806, 10 September 1903, Page 1

THE FOOTBALL FIELD.

JNOTES. (By QUIDNUNC.) The jßrst oi the season's representative matches between the north and south sections of the province gave the Canterbury Selection Committee auotiic-r opportunity to do tie "hat tricks" on Saturday night; but that 'will »c discussed later. In all >th» crowd represented by the £62 gate and free passes, legitimate or otherwise, the only people who seemed to be consistently eoijoymg themselves were the South Canteibmry forwards, and their mode of diverting themselves often took' the form of dreary • line-play* Unfortunately, their interests compelled tiheini' to take no riaks in. throwing the ball .in, and their inability to work the bunch line-out with even rudimentary success induced a state of things that made the spectators mutter. Canterbury gener-' ally had no excuse- for close-reefing on the t^uch-line, yet Mahoney, - on~ the east side, persistently lobbed the ball in, 'imitating. South Canterbury's policy. In the first ten minutes the southern, forwards made it apparent to the public, and painfully so- to theiv opponents, *thafc they had wind and pace which were likely to last. They slackened only fora- little breathing space, which mainly allowed north to score, and then gave the local men a; vigorous buffeting. The packs were evenly weighted,' but "the> soutlieniei-s. shoved together rather better than their opponents, whose fonnationi Bad a kink in the first spell, due to a little sharking of Svork by one or two of the alleged ?* pushers." The result was that the ball very often went oub at tie South Canterbury end of the scrummage. In the. loose, too, the visitors' , vanguard gave a clever display of footwork. When a nian got, away he went as if he was going to catch a train — not the north tram— rarely .overstepped the ball, and was always backed up. The result was some of the fastest and. cleanest foot rushing that has been seen at the Park this season. With their forwards almost monopolising the play in the last twenty minutes of ttte first spell and for lengthy periods in the second j it is surprising that the southerners did not get mome than one try. The exphuiation lay in the" lack of scoring men. Gaff aney, five-eighths, was the only baick with aay respectable attacking ability, and ihe was too : well marked to • prove formidable. Had he. been on the wing, with a- tolerable five-eighths and centre, to feed" him, his lithe form and 'fleet feet would have found a gap or two in the northerners 1 defence; The local representatives' attack was irksome to e.ven the patient Pressmen, who a.re never supposed to get tired of hearing or seeing the dreariest things on the globe. D. M'PhaiLricked his back a couple of minutes after the kickoff, and was^of no assistance to Harvey, who always had two nimble wing-forwards-diving ior .him on the few occasions that the ball went his way in the first spell. lii the second half, King- replaced M'Phail. the forwards packed better, and the CJiiistchurch half-back was more liberally fed, but his passing was often crude. If he was as neat with his hands as with his feet, the team would be strengthened. Even allowing for Harvey's shortconriugc, tihe two j i five-eighths, Deans and Wood, were "in , the. road." Deans did not seem- in good ? heart, and the fatuous folk in the stand got. him -flurried, till; he Jiardly .Jknew.- bis head from, his- feet. -vWoifd showed disappointing form,; His handling was iirequeritIy clumsy, and he wound about, * and in and out. like the brook that flowed past Phillip's farm, with a vague notion of going somewhere or other. Occasionally Ihe ' shone .•brilliantly, notably itv cutting in to" make an opening, which allowed Rice to score, but how many times did he cut in only to get knocked down? He should remember that he has a three-quarter line to support him. Manning, at full, was not a conspicuous i success for North Canterbury. His left^ leg owns t<be stronger foot," and tlfis made him find the wrong line, sometimes, or, rather, endeavour to find the wrong line. He is somewhat slow at times in getting in his >kick, a weakness which makes a spectator's back-bone feel cTeepy. D. M'Gregor, on tlw right wing, gave about the cleanest dis play among the backs, and he was followed by Rice Both these players, with Harvey, were about the only men on the ground whose kicking was reliable. P. Menzies was the "sarnie old Peter." Cooke,.Atkinson, Evans amd 1 Fanning were afbout. the, least tired of the forwards. . , South Canterbury liad a good full-back in E. Horgan. He did his work smartly and' neatly, i The three-quarter line, •D. H-crgon, Grant and Connolly, was mediocre in attack, but fairly solid in defence. Gaffaney , the five-eighths, has been mentioned. His kicking used to Ac good, but has greatly deteriorated. Opie, behind the scinm, often put \p. -as much work as a couple of forwards in the ruck. The " little man witih fbe white pants" was often pTominent in the loose, but he. did not ' impress one as a goad general in directing a passin 5 attack. The forwards- all bore a fair share of the hard work. In fast, loose play, Husband, wing, was full of skilful dash. The other wing, Joe, was also often in evidence," a,nd so was Lawlor. The South. Canterbury forwards followed UP fast, and generally got their men. At' kinson, of the local' pack, used to be "out by himself," but seldom caught the man with the ball. Once or twice he grabbed the " man who had had the ball," and threw him, to the disgust of the' crowd. Menzies and Grant had a little "dud." The local three-quarter was success; .uUy charged by the visitor When taking the ball, and made a rapid acquaintance with the ground. A moment later the ball went Grant's way, with Menzies in hot pursuit, his eyes glaring for satisfaction, but the southerner turned his back on the foe, and unostentatiously marked. The* incident recalls an adventure of " Off-side Mac's " in a match, Wellington v. Auckland, at Newtown Park, some years ago. . Mackenzie, in his tired sort of way, had been playing tunes on various parts oi a bipc, opposing wing-forward's frame, and the Aucklander waited patiently for a " chance." It came while the philosophic Wellingtonian was taking the ball from a high punt. He marked, bat went down with more haste than comfort. He gather sd himself up coolly, noted where th: enemy was posted, kicked away up in thi air, and sprinted down the field. He arrived at his destination just -when the Auckiander was jumping for the ball, got tlu hostile winger well imder the arm-pits, and made that gentleman spin round like a teetotum once or twice before his astonished body ieached the inhospitable earth. E. Cooke, standing back when the visitors were kicking, took the ball twice cleanly enough, but each, time his return p«unt rebounded from an opponent. The second bounce drew a query from the gallery : "Where did you learn that, Rue?" The bunch "line-out, to be worked effect ively, needs a little more manoeuvring tha' i blind, senseless, peLl-mell jambing of al sorts and sizes of forwards close in. Theu should always be a double rank, say thrc ar. four of the tallest in front ,_ and the other: behind. ■ The man throwing in has a cleai target for his aim, the- taker whips the bal behind his back, his mates pack round an-d they can then either break through or screw. When closely defending, ol course the "bunch" would post itself near t^toisJl-JLuJg^ub otberwjse take up_

i stand well clear of the line. A few years ..,to— it can bear repeating— a light team nf forwards, the St Patrick's College pack, used to sweep the field from a bunch lineout, against the heaviest forward teams in Wellington. The manoeuvre was well practised in the "gym," 'but it more than repaid the time spent in learning it. Fanning, lock in the, local team, .screwed ihe scrums rather effectively two or three times, when the backs refrained from clamouring for the ball, which was useless to them when they gob' 1 it. ' • The funniest feature of Canterbury football at present is the vagaries of the Selection Committee. .The committee was appointed! to select, and it stolidly regards it as a solemn duty to'. do as much selecting a® the seven days. in the week will allow. Disregarding " tk-e "hat" theory for the mo=inent, it is hoard 1 to. locate the principle on. which the wizards work. They put a forward out for what the "Bulletin," calls. "T.F." (tired feeling), give him a week or, two's spell to get- at little more tired, and then run him in again, with tbe result that the team always 'contains two or three somnambulist's. One of the latest freaks- is to ourt Deans in Lavery's favour, merely because, the burly five-eighth© -was off-colour on Saturday, probably through, unavoidable indisposition (not malignant " T.F." or beri-beri— the sleeping sickness that seems to attack other people besides niggers). Deans has .played- consistently well all the season, and has especially shown sterling defensive abilities.. which should .atone for slight tactical blunders, By the way the selectors select,, one is reminded of Omar Kayyam's quatrain : — " It's all a checker board of nights and days, Where, destiny ,with anem fcr pieces pLays, And moves' them up and down, and mates and slays, „ And one by one back in tiro iocker lays. But if the "hat" theory is correct all these speculations are vain. ( Looking at some of Canterbury's -weary panting 'forwards on Saturday, and stopping the ears against the blatant Heatings of the ' sixpenny cruics in -the- stand, one, could; not escape the reflection, "If they could only change wind!" ..,; ; Before the members of the Hawke's iJay football team left for the north by the Rot6mahinai»on September 1, Mr Renouf, the manager, presented Mr W. G. Garrard, the | secretary. >of the Canterbury Rugby Union, with a silver-mounted letter case and. a photograph, of the team, and Mr G. H. ] Mason, vice-president, vwith a photograph j of > the team, as a mark of their apprecia- 1 tion of the kindness 'shewn, them daring their visit to* Christ church. J. Duncan, P. Given -and W. Stead;- were given a hearty reception by the- Ot.ago Rugby Union on their arrival in, Dunedin last weeik, after tlreir Australian tour. J. i Duncan, in the course of r> brief speech, indicated that there was a little friction at j times in the management of the team.- He ] referred to differences of opinion -with the i Match 'Committee when he was . in the minority, the disagreement, being over the di-posal of th? fivceighths. am-d other matters. There were no footballers in the world like the Aucklanders, he said, with much irouy. ■ The Warbrick who -met such an awful death through the unexpected eruption of the Waimangu Geyser, at Rotorua, was Joe, probably the most famous of the famous family of Native players. He was a member of the New Zealand Native team which visited England, in 18S8-9, and .was mainly responSible' for getting the team together.' ' He played in his first representative match' in 1877. at the early age of fifteen, as a member of the Auckland' team, against Otago. At various times he played for, Auckland, Wellington and Hawke's Bay, and was a member of the New Zealand team which visited New South Wales in 1884. He practically gave up the game in 1894. The match New South Wales versus Queensland resulted in the defeat of Queensland by eleven to three. They have an umpire in Westralia named Albert Sohwan, a, big burly fellow who once played a great game at Wallaroo-, amd is known to all old-time Adelaide players, and., it. is. stated that no umpire, ever controlled a game in the way Albert does.' He is ovei' six feet, big and burly, and hats the strength of a horse. When a player recently; made scone personal remarks, aimed at Albert, the. latter signalled the timekeepers to take time off while he proceeded to throw, the player over the fence. On another occasion Sch wan stopped a match while <he went into the pavilion and administered a thra hing to a spectator who used . impolite language. The Westralians say truthfully and convincragly that " Albert never loses control of -.the ganne." The following paragraph is from a recent , issue of the "Athletic News": — "When the Northern Rugby Union passed' the resolution at its annual meeting that a snatch should be annually, .played- between' English players v. other nationalities, we wonder whether it was cognisant cf the f acfe that three Maori footballers have decided to come into Lancashire. At present we ar c sworn to secrecy as to the identity of: the New Zealandtrs, but it is sufficient to say that they are pupils of J. Warwick, one of the cleverest players who toured England dairing the Maori invasion a, few years back. One of the trio of colonials is a 'half-back of great merit, possessing. the dash of Lomas with the wiliness and trickiness of the Jameses." Now, who are the New Zea■land footballers?