KeithQuinnRugby
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23 October 2014
The things you find at home all these years later. While rummaging through some family shots I came across this picture I took from the commentary scaffold at what was then Buckhurst Park in Suva, Fiji. It shows the Fiji and British Isles teams coming onto the field before the playing of the last game of the Lions 26 match tour of New Zealand and Fiji in 1977. I think the high aspect of the shot might make it unique to Fiji rugby history. The scaffold was so rickety no photographers were allowed on it. This was the day Fiji's national team scored perhaps their most famous home victory. Fiji won 25-21. They could be rightly proud of course but it is true the Lions did not approach the fixture with true dedication. I can still recall their poolside party raging on and keeping me awake 16 hours before kickoff!
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And the Richie McCaw led, and Graham Henry coached, 2011 All Blacks begin their campaign by beating Tonga 41-10 on Eden Park
DARROUY, CHRISTIAN
Mont-de-Marsan and France
40 internationals for France 1957–67
A Mont-de-Marsan wing who scored 23 tries in internationals for his country and who stayed in the French team for 10 years. Captain of his country in 1967, taking over from fellow club man Michel Crauste, Darrouy led the team to a Five Nations championship win and was so pleased he sent a famous telegram to President de Gaulle containing just two words – ‘Mission accomplished.’
He was once described as a ‘greyhound’ wing in the style of Adolphe Jaureguy, a star French player in the 1920s.
Darrouy was captain on his last tour, to South Africa in 1967, one of the few wingers to lead any international team on a tour. This was France’s only four-test series: his team lost the first two games but surprised with a win in the third and a draw in the fourth.
At the time of his retirement he was France’s highest try-scorer in internationals and had also beaten Jean Dupuy’s record as France’s most-capped wing.
His best performance in an international came when he scored three tries against Ireland at Lansdowne Road in 1964. He also had the satisfaction of sprinting nearly 50 metres to score the winning try against South Africa in Springs in the only test of France’s 1964 tour.
Which international rugby player who went to two Rugby World Cups also won two Olympic Games Gold Medals and 2 World Championship bronze medals in a chosen 'other' sport?
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