LANCASTER PARK DISPUTE

Press, Volume LXXXII, Issue 24909, 24 June 1946, Page 6

LANCASTER PARK DISPUTE

STATEMENT BY PRESIDENT OF N.Z. LEAGUE

MATCHES IN SOUTH ISLAND MAY BE CANCELLED

“ The Press " Special Service AUCKLAND, June 20. Because of the refusal of the Canterbury Rugby Union to allow the Rugby League use of Lancaster Park for the match England v. South Island, the English team will not be able to play in Christchurch, said Mr J. A. Redwood, president of the New Zealand Rugby League. The team’s itinerary would now have to be redrafted, said Mr Redwood, and it was possible that the game against the West Coast at Greymouth would have to be cancelled.

It was unfortunate, he said, that all the enclosed playing areas in Christchurch suitable for Rugby football were controlled by the Rugby Union. Though the Canterbury Rugby League submitted the highest tender for the use of the Show Grounds for the 1946 season, the Rugby Union was granted the use and control of that area for a much lower figure, thereby gaining control of the only free ground in Christchurch.

Mr Redwood expressed disappointment at the attitude of the Canterbury Rugby Union toward Rugby League generally. After offering as its first excuse for refusal that it needed the ground for its own matches, the union granted the use of the park to the Football Association on the day applied for by the Rugby League Board of Control.

“The union now states that it is affiliated to the English Rugby Union, which would not permit a Rugby Union ground to be used by professionals,” he said. Mr Redwood instanced how Wigan, an English Rugby League team, played a Rugby Union team on an English Rugby Union ground during the war.

Although the Englishmen were professionals, Mr Redwood denied that Rugby League in New Zealand was a professional game. The New Zealand Rugby League was an amateur body and the players under its jurisdiction were amateurs.