A. E. Cooke Gives Brilliant Display

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 351, 11 May 1928, Page 10

A. E. Cooke Gives Brilliant Display

RUGBY AT MASTERTON

The match at Masterton recently between Old Boys and Red Star resolved itself into Cooke versus Red Star, says the “N.Z. Sportsman.”

With a brilliance unequalled in any club game in the Wairarapa for many years, and surpassing any previous

exhibition given by him, Cooke tvas at times playing the whole opposition himself. There was not an Old Boys’ attacking or scoring movement which did not have the brains and initiative of the All Black as the foundation. The opposition might just as well have been a sheet of paper for all the resistance that it

was able to bring about to stop the brilliant dashes of this super-player. Time and again the brilliant exAucklander would “Charleston” his way right through the Star backs, sidestepping and zig-zagging with more ingenuity and precision than any other player has shown in the Wairarapa for many a season. Others mav have done the scoring at times, but it was the superb play of Cooke that made the opening, and shepherded it home to a successful conclusion.

Without the brilliance, aggressiveness and brains of Cooke it is hard to say how the white backs would have shaped collectively.

Thanks to this king-pin the Old Boys backs gave a most pleasing and clever display of that kind of football the public pay to see. The Star pack was a better one than the Old Boys’, and in the second spell, once the ball got past them, Cooke commenced his aggressive brilliance.

tries, and runners-up two points. The losers of semi-final bouts will be matched with each other to see who shall be clased third and gain one point for his country. Scotland lost to England in the professional Association football players’" match, but won the amateur game. The reason why it won the amateur game was that there had not been a clinking of cash to bring blue bonnets over the border. GREAT FORWARDS If England has in 1930, when she will send a Rugby team to New Zealand, forwards as good as those which played for her in the season which has just ended at Home, the Dominion will see some great struggles. Commenting on