"NONE OF US WANT TO SEE AUSTRALIA AGAIN"

Chronicle (Levin), 27 June 1947, Page 6

"NONE OF US WANT TO SEE AUSTRALIA AGAIN"

CHRISTCHURCH, June 26. So disgusted alre .members of the South African soccer team with Australian id-eas of sportsmanship, that they are seeking to spend a fortnight longer in New Zealand than is allowed fof in the itinerary drawn up by the New Zealand Football Association. Accprding to the programme that has been.-arranged for them, they would l'eave New Zealand on July 10 by aix for Sydney and leave there by the Larg.s Bay on August 20. '"None of us evef wants to see Austraiia again, "said the manager, Mr. J. Barbour this morning, when the team arrived f romvWellington. "If we had known that spccer 'in Austraiia is pro fessional we would never have gone there tecause in South Africa we. are insistent on the dilference between amateur. and professionai sport more than any other country in the world. 1 think South Africa has stood up for amateur sport and there is little professionai sport there. Members of our team get £3 a week out of poeket expenses and we got a shock when we loarned that Australian players were getting £12 a mateh with hotel aceommodation and all expenses thrown in. . ''From what we saw of it there is no real sport in Austraiia," Mr. Barbour declar.ed. "The wliole set up is rotten with nioney? There is a lot of betting on the outcojne of matehes. We objected to the man who refereed all the ,test matehes. Some of his decisions were quite obviously • unfair. In fact in the last test he was booed by the crowd and when an Australian crowd boos an Australian referee of a match against a visiting team) he must be pretty blatant in the unfairness of his decisions. " . ' ' Wo heard that a lot of money had been lost on the result of the tests.'Our team actualy played against the same team ten times, " said Mt. Barbour, "and when they could not beat us they set out in the last couple of games to maim us, deliberately and intentionall \ kicking and foul chargmg our boys to maim them.- It was not soccer at all but still vve lost only once against them and drew once on muddy grounds thatour boys are not used to. Fair refereeing would have produced a very different score in both those games. In Sydney alone there are more soccer players than there are in the whole of South Africa so whether we played Austraiia or New South Wales it was still the same team. ' ' Quite a lot of the members of our team met New Zealanders in the Middle East, " said -Mr. Barbour. "With the exception of two who were too young to enlist, they all saw service. They liked the New Zealanders that they met overseas and they "have foun'd them equally likeable' at home. " As the result of brilliant play against Wellington yesterday two members of the visiting side will get their caps as .South African represcntatives by being included in the team to play in the first t'est "against New Zealand at 'Lancaster' Park on Saturday. These are J. Pretorius, right half, and S. Olinn, outside left. The standard of soccer in New Zealand as reveal-ed in the two games that the team had played here, was much higher than in Austraiia, said Mr. Barbour. The Auckland and Wellington tcanis had played clean scicntilic football. In Auckland tiie South Africans had found it difficult for a while to pick up the knaek of keeping their foot ing on the sodden ground but they got on to the idea quicker than had been hoped. The South African soccer team to play the first test against New Zealand at Lancaster Park on Saturday is: J. Pickerill, II. D. McCreadie, E. Dowell, J. Pretorius, H. Naish, D. Forbes, D. Wilson, G. Faleoner, B. Clack, E. II. Smethurst (captain), and S. Olinn.