City Scents Battle

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 385, 20 June 1928, Page 11

City Scents Battle

FIRST TILT AT PONSONBY Varsity Favoured by Recent Form MEETING Ponsonbv for the first time in senior Rugby, the promoted City team will no doubt try to make nest Saturday’s match, which concludes the first round, a memorable encounter from its own point of view. But it will need to improve a lot on last Saturday’s display. On recent form there is only one team in the competition. That team is Varsity.

A S far as can be determined at present, tw'o full rounds will be played in the Auckland senior competition. No competition matches will be played while the rep. team is on tour. A Bad Start Maurice Brownlie made a bad start as captain of 'the All Blacks. The team lost the first two matches in which he captained it. * * * Selector’s Win Norman McKenzie, All Black selector, is reported by the Napier “Daily Telegraph” to have won a new hat on a wager that the All Blacks would not go through their tour unbeaten. He must have known something. Useful Young Young, the Manukau hooker, is good in the ring, as well as on the football field. An ex-cham-pion ifiiddle-weight boxer, he knows how to use his fists, as well as his feet. It is perhaps just as well that there are few more goodnatured footballers than the smiling citizen who looks out of the adjoining picture. * * The Merry-go-round Rugby form as a reliable guide is a myth. For instance, Sacred Heart beat Mount Albert Grammar easily; King’s in turn beat Sacred Heart, by a margin of nearly 20 points; and then, on Saturday, Mount Albert beat King’s by 8 to 6 (two tries and a conversion to two penalties). If this happened on the turf there would be a meeting of the stewards. How They Run Elsewhere In the Auckland senior championship. Ponsonby and University are level. Leading teams in other parts of the Dominion are shown herewith: Wellington.—Oriental is two points ahead of Varsity and Poneke.

Wanganui.—Marists five points ahead of Old Boys. Napier.—Pirates three points ahead of Old Boys. Taranaki. —Stratford leading from Inglewood and Star. Christchurch.—-University one point ahead of Old Boys. Dunedin. —Varsity leading from Kaikorai. Timaru.—Old Boys and Celtic level. Invercargill.—Pirates and Star level. Strong Teams of Students Perhaps the outstanding feature of club Rugby in the four main centres is the prominence of the University teams, which in Christchurch, Auckland and Dunedin are at the head of the tables, while in Wellington the University side, after inflicting a crushing defeat on the leaders, is now only two points behind Oriental. Always Handy This is to nominate L. Hook as Auckland’s most versatile footballer. Already this season he has p'ayed fullback, halfback, centre, rover and wing threequarter. In the mud and moisture last Saturday he showed footwork just as pretty as his handling—and that is no mean testimonial. He is Ponsonby’s handy man, and there is no telling, from ms recent satisfactory demonstrations of versatility, that he won’t be invited to lock the scrum or go down in the front row before the season is over. <= * * Three-two-three As if answering The Sun’s query, “What club side in Auckland” will pioneer the three-man front row,” Grammar put down a trinity of frontrankers against Shore last Saturday. The Springbok formation won honours on the day, for it gave Grammar a predominant share of the ball. Good Refereeing Eden Park has seen few better exhi-

bitions of refereeing than that given last Saturday, under difficult conditions, by Mr. J. Shepherd, whose rulings were so clear, crisp and logical that more than one onlooker wondered why he has not been grouped with “the big five.” Question of Identity It was in the Marist-Ponsonby match last Saturday, when the players, in gathering gloom that intensified their muddy appearance, were nothing better than drab spectres moving in a mist. The whistle blew, and the referee walked up to a tall forward, masked in mud and moisture. “Who are you?” he asked, or words to that effect, and the import of his query indicated that, were he a Marist man, the player was on side; if for Ponsonby, he was not. The player’s name was McCarthney. He was off-side. ... Don Wright Again The magic name o£ Don Wright has been only a memory in Auckland Rugby since 1926, the year after Wright toured Australia with the All Black team that was Intended to provide material for the South African tour (and didn’t); but on Saturday it was recalled from the past. Wright

was in his old place, behind the Grammar pack at North Shore, but when Badeley reappears he will probably go back to his retirement. He states that he has no intention of playing regularly. Grammar is endeavouring to induce L. Knight, another 1925 All Black, to turn out again. After two years’ inactivity. Knight now weighs close on 17 stone. . • • Jamieson (Ponsonby) gave a good all-round display last Saturday, much improving on his form of the Saturday before.