LEAGUE RUMOUR

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1044, 7 August 1930, Page 13

LEAGUE RUMOUR

COUNCIL CHAIRMAN’S FLAT DENIAL

“ABSOLUTELY GROUNDLESS” A flat denial to any suggestion of the New Zealand Rugby League touring team being stranded in Australia has been made by Mr. Cyril A. Snedden, chairman of the council of the New Zealand Rugby Football League. Speaking at the meeting of the Management Committee of the Auckland Rugby League last evening during the course of negotiations for the staging of a match, Auckland v. New Zealand, when the team returns. Mr. Snedden said: “There is not now, and there never was at any time, any possibility of the team being stranded in Australia.” The report that the team was likely to be stranded if more money was not forthcoming appeared in the Sydney evening newspapers on Monday evening, and was cabled to New Zealand the following day.

“It is hard to soy what prompted that statement,” Mr. Snedden said.

“unless it is the work of some ‘cub’ reporter who thought he saw a landslide in the League code. The statement is absolutely groundless.” Before the team left New Zealand the chairman said, the council had taken precautions for all eventuali ties. “We were not to forsee the bad luck which has dogged the team since it arrived in Australia. Injuries have meant that the party has at no time been at full strength.” Speaking at a conference between the managers of the New’ Zealand team and the New South Wales Rugby League on Monday evening, Mr. A. Ferguson, financial manager of the New Zealand team, also gave a denial to the statements in the Sydney Press.