WAIRARAPA ASK FOR AN INQUIRY.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18208, 15 July 1927, Page 1

WAIRARAPA ASK FOR AN INQUIRY.

CHARGE MADE THAT BARCLAY SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN PLAYED. (Special to the “ Star.”) MASTERTON, July 15. The Wairarapa Rugby Union last evening decided to request the New Zealand Management Committee to investigate the bona fides of W. Barclay, the Maori player, -who played for the Hawke’s Bay team against Wairarapa last Saturday. The opinion was expressed at the meeting that Barclay had no', ulfilled the necessary residential qualification of twenty-one days before participatI ing in the match ..Mr E. M’Kenzie, secretary df the Wairarapa Union, explained that at a conference between Wairarapa and Hawke’s Bay officials on- the night before the match the Wairarapa Union questioned the bona fides ofg Barclay regarding his residential qualifications. The matter was then approach ed on the lines that fourteen days was the necessary qualification. Mr N. A. M’Kenzie, manager of the Hawke’s Bay team, had replied that Barclay had fulfilled the qualification, having arrived from Auckland fifteen days prior to July 9, to take over a business which he had purchased in Napier, Mr M’Kenzie added that subsequently he had discovered that according to Rule 43 of the New Zealand Rugby Union rule book, any player participating in inter-provincial football had to reside for at least twentyone days in his province before taking part in any representative game. Mr E. Freeman said that Barclay did not leave Auckland until June 20, so he could not have been in Napier for three weeks before the game with Wairarapa. Mr A. Johnson: It is rather strange that Barclay was selected in the Hawke’s Bay team without ever hav-j ing played a game in the Bay this season. Mr E. Freeman said that he thought that the Wairarapa Union had strong grounds for a protest, and moved that the chairman, secretary and treasurer gather data and submit a protest to the New Zealand Union, asking them to take up the matter, i Mr W. Darvill referred to the discussion at a conference with the Bay of--1 ficials, when Mr Norman M’Kenzie, i:i reply to a question, remarked, “Do j you think that Hawke’s Bay would be i so unsportsmanlike as to play a man I who was ineligible?” 1 “My reply,” said Mr Darvill, was, i “ There’s no sentiment in business.” | Mr M'Kenzie: I went to the confer-