NEW ZEALAND FOOTBALLERS

Gisborne Times, Volume XIX, Issue 1619, 5 December 1905, Page 2

NEW ZEALAND FOOTBALLERS

A TIRED REFEREE. ROYAL PATRONAGE. By telegraph. Press Ass’n, Copyright

Sydney, Dee 5. | Tho London Daily Mail, commenting on the Surrey match, says it was probably the greatest football farce in the history of the game ever enacted. The Richmond spectators expected to see some wonderful football, but reckoned without the referee. This gentleman, a Londoner, and a member of the Rugby Union Committee, was evidently under the impression that everybody had come to hear him perform on the whistle. The fantasia commenced the

! first minute, and continued with brief intervals for respiration throughout the game. Rain fell in torrents, and between the ba r s of the referee’s interminable selections the players flipped and flopped about the slippery ground like seals on an ice floe, but there was no football. Twentyfive minutes from the stait the referee Bhowed signs ol fatigue. The New Zealanders seizod the opportunity to cross the line, and kicked a goal. Several explana-

tiens were advanced for the referee’s extraordinary laps', but the two mest generally accepted were that be had either dropped the whistle or the pea in it stuck. Unabashed at his temporary eclipse, he blew harder than ever for the remainder of the spell. Football was out of the question. During tho interval he was the recipient of congratulations oil his suss tained musical effort. Fears were expressed that his eevere exettions would tell on him in the second spell. This was only too true. The whittle failed on two occasions. Scores followed, and still there was no football. It was an exposition of tho power of music to tame even tho New Zealand footballers. ,

Mr Percy Cole, Rugby Union Secretary, published an opinion that the English Rugby team would boat the colonials, leaving Wales out of the question altogether.

,(P®r Press Association.) .Wellington,last night. Mr Seddon has received the following from the High Commissioner s “ The Daily News’ representative states that the .King met eight of our football team to-day (Monday) at tbe Agricultural Hall. He shook hands with Tyler, and congratulated them on their success, and said he took special interest in the match reports.” . .