MAORI TOURING TEAM.
DRAW WITH MIDLAND EAST. London, November 18. A hard, thrilling struggle at Northampton between the Maoris and East Midlands ended equitably in a draw, two tries apiece, after East Midlands had held a lead for the greater part of the game. The Maoris territorially had more of the play, but the backs, though faster, finished badly, the combination repeatedly breaking down at critical moments. There was little to choose between the sides of forwards for if East Midlands was more often atop in the serums, the Maoris were frequently dangerous in the open. Midlands opened brilliantly, and deserved the half-time lead of 6 to 3. Fensome and Birch scored unconverted tries, after Lockwood had opened the scoring with a try for the Maoris.
In the second spell the Maoris played up desperately and for long stretches kept, their opponents on the defensive. The latter’s great tackling and the Maoris poor finishing prevented equalising until on the close of the game. Falwasser then crossed, following a good bout of passing. Had the Maoris midfield play been rounded off near the line they would have won but the Midlanders’ gallant defence entitled them to a draw.
Phillips made a good full-back, but Pelham was soundest behind the scrum, although Falwasser ran strongly and was difficult to stop. Olsen, Gemmell, Wilson, and Haupapa acquitted themselves well amongst the forwards who, like their opponents, revelled in hard work. The Maori team consisted of Falwasser, Phillips, Pelham, Lockwood, Kingi, Bell, Lowe, Olsen, Dennis, Gemmell, Tatana, Rika, Nelson Manihera and Haupapa.
The 1924-25 All Blacks beat East Midlands by 31 points to seven.
Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/MH19261120.2.23
Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka
Manawatu Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 3565, 20 November 1926, Page 3
Word count
Tapeke kupu
270MAORI TOURING TEAM. Manawatu Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 3565, 20 November 1926, Page 3
Using this item
Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi
Stuff Ltd is the copyright owner for the Manawatu Herald. You can reproduce in-copyright material from this newspaper for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). This newspaper is not available for commercial use without the consent of Stuff Ltd. For advice on reproduction of out-of-copyright material from this newspaper, please refer to the Copyright guide.