KeithQuinnRugby
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4 January 2015
I know this is technically not a 'favourite photo' - but I love it all the same. I can't resist putting this programme cover up on site from my home collection. I do it under the heading of 'will we ever see games like this EVER again in modern rugby?" (ie; a real 'minnow' rugby union against a rugby 'powerhouse.') This classic was from the 1968 All Blacks tour of Australia. It was the second game of a 12 match tour and New Zealand won 74-0.
It was the first time 'Tazzy' had played a major touring team.
The first rugby in Tasmania was played as an exhibition by two teams of New Zealand sailors off a visiting naval vessel in 1926. The Tasmanian Rugby Union was formed in 1933. In its first 80 years no Tasmanian had ever made Wallaby status.
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The ABs win in the Wellington wind v France!
Ships couldn't berth on this fierce stormy day but the test went ahead anyway. NZ won 5-3 and hundreds of hats and scarves disappeared forever!
INTERNATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP
The annual matches played between England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and France were known as the Five Nations championship, or the International rugby championship from 1883 to 2000. When Italy joined in 2000 it was logical that the title for the showpiece to be generally known as The Six Nations Championship.
Ii is not widely known that in fact for over 100 years there was no such official tournament by name. The matches played were merely the annual fixtures between the British, Irish and French countries and it was only the media and fans who awarded a ‘Championship’ at the end of the season. There was no official trophy or title at stake. In 1992 official recognition came for the tournament and a trophy was awarded.
Terry Godwin, who wrote a book in 1984 on the international championship’s first 100 years, could find no definite date when public reference to a ‘championship’ was first made. Godwin believed it was near 1893 or 1894, some 10 years after annual matches had begun involving all four British and Irish teams. In the years that followed, only random mention was made to the ‘championship’ winners or ‘wooden spoon’ winners each year. And even when France was added to the list of annual fixtures for the four ‘home’ teams, it was left off published championship tables until after World War I.
The tournament has encouraged its own terminology. A ‘Grand Slam’ is the winning against all five other teams in the same season. A ‘Triple Crown’ refers to British teams winning against the other three home country teams. France or Italy cannot win a Triple Crown.
What did the famous Welsh and British Lions hooker Bobby Windsor achieve on his 42nd birthday?
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