KeithQuinnRugby
Thinking and talking about rugby every day for 50+ years
You are here: Home » Favourite Photos » It's my website so if i like I can put in a favourite cricket photo I took in 2015!
2 January 2016
Starting off 2016's favourite photo section with a cricket pic instead of rugby? Why not? It's my website! But read on with the slight rugby connection!
In November 2015, just after the end of the 2015 Rugby World Cup my wife and I took a trip to Adelaide to watch the first-ever day/night cricket test.
And it was money well spent!
We loved the game between New Zealand and Australia and its three-day excitement (and also the two days of wine touring South Australia which therefore followed!)
I took my camera to the ground and pointed it at the (historic?) moment when Brendan McCullum packed in seven slips (or four slips and three gulleys) as his NZ team pressed ever aggressively for late wickets to fall by the Aussies on the third night.
The wickets didn't tumble and Australia won - but I think the photo has merit. The seven slips were only in place for about 3 balls.
There was a slight rugby connection for me at the famous Adelaide Oval. For about five years I was part of the broadcast team which commentated sevens there on the IRB tour. But on those occasions I was dumb and numb. Each year the media had, as their working room, the Australian cricket team's dressing room. Around the hallowed walls were honours boards with great cricketing name's achievements listed (including D.G.Bradman's many times)
But in those five years did I take one photograph to possibly include here?
No - not one!
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A hotel ruckus after NZ had beaten Wales 19-16 saw Keith Murdoch banished from the tour. He stopped in Oz and hasn't yet made it home yet!
DAUGA, BENOIT
Mont-de-Marsan and France
63 internationals for France 1964–72
Benoit Dauga was a highly versatile forward who played for his country in three positions – lock, No. 8 and flanker. A lineout specialist, he was an expert leaper and dispatcher of the ball to his halfback. Some of the media called him the ‘control tower’ of French 1ineout play, and others the ‘Eiffel Tower’. He was also a strong runner and a highly competitive forward.
Dauga’s debut in international rugby was not auspicious. He had to wait until his fifth test before he was in a winning team (v Italy 1964). He maintained his place in French test teams until he reached 63 caps, which equalled the record set by Michel Crauste in 1966.
A big man, Dauga stood 1.94 metres tall (6 feet 41/2in) and weighed 110 kilograms (17 stone). His frame was such that he stretched rugby shirts to their limit and socks could not pass over his calf muscles! He also had what some might describe as a prominent nose. Colin Meads, his New Zaaland lineout rival, once light-heartedly said of Dauga, 'He's the only man I know who could smoke a cigarette while taking a shower!'
Dauga was highly regarded and played in most countries in the rugby world, including New Zealand and Australia in 1968, and South Africa in 1971. He was a French captain as well.
His rugby playing days ended in 1975 when he was injured in a club match for his beloved Mont-de-Marsan, suffering temporary paralysis of the arms and legs, and requiring a long spell in hospital before recovering his fitness and resuming his interest in the game.
Why did the Wallaby rugby team only practice in the afternoons at the 1987 Rugby World Cup?
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