Potential Kiwis?

Press, 20 April 1979, Page 26

Potential Kiwis?

By

JOHN COFFEY

The first, and rather tentative, steps towards assembling the New Zealand’ rugby league test squad to! meet Britain will be taken! this week-end when the zonal minor inter-provincial competitions begin throughout the country. Kiwi honours might be a long way from the Canterbury B and Otago-Southiand players who are to meet at the Show Grounds tomor-! row, but at least they have) been given an unprecedented chance to impress under the revised selection system. I Similarly, the new five-! man national panel will! view fixtures between the other South Island second division sides. West Coast B and Marlborough-Tasman Bays (at Greymouth), and also Gisborne-East Coast! and Hawke’s Bay at Gisborne, Wanganui and Manawatu at Wanganui, Bay of Plenty and Midlands at Ro-

■ torua, and Northland and !Hamilton at Whangarei. •I In addition to defending • the title won last year, the; 1! members of the Canterbury! > B team will be seeking: places in the Rest of South’ > Island XIII to oppose! Canterbury on June 4. The! third tier of the selection! policy starts with the nam-I ing of the full island side to! contest the inter-district j | competition against North-; ern. Central and Auckland, j Canterbury B struggled i against its West Coast! (counterpart a season ago,! j but should be too strong for; its rivals this time. Only! ! Auckland of the other rugby j league provinces could af- ■ ford to confer B team status I on such well-known foot- ; bailers as Mark Lowe.; i Danny Millward, Mutu Stone | and Lewis Hudson. | Lowe actually represented I Auckland in all but one of its six games in 1978 and! , has made a favourable im-i pression in his early appear-! ■ ances in the Addington!

I; front-row. Millward, his ’ propping partner, earned a •: Kiwi trial last year, and both Stone and Hudson have '’been regular choices for ; Canterbury A. i! It would be surprising if a ■’number of others did not; press for promotion to the i top team in the months | ahead. Rick Odering and >1 Derek McLaughlan have already been called up as re- ■; placements for the full i Canterbury line-up to playj at Lower Hutt next Tuesday evening. Bruce Murphy, Odering’s fellow '! centre, must also have merited serious consid- ' eration. Otago-Southland was well < beaten by Canterbury B last ■ winter, before achieving a ■ I most unexpected win at the ' expense of West Coast B. The code has expanded ! rapidly in Southland, and > has benefited from an influx jof players from other areas j who are employed at freeziling works in the south.