So let's have a bit of fun today. Feel free to comment on the Herald's list, and suggest your own candidates for inclusion, given that the list only has one per country. Or feel free (again) to list individual cases of thuggery
that you may have witnessed through the years.We'll start the ball rolling. Mark "Cowboy" Shaw was a hard, hard man, but a flippin' good flanker. But he didn't suffer fools gladly, as Australian lock Ian Williams will attest. Williams nursed a broken jaw after a right cross from Shaw in the second Bledisloe Cup test in 1980. Of course, those were the days before citings and endless TV replays, and Shaw escaped any on-field or post-match punishment. It did however give him a reputation of a bloke to stay on the right side of!
6 comments:
Colin Meads had the reputation of being a thug but I can only recall him decking one player in a test - Dai Young from Wales at Eden Park I think - 1963?
There is of course the thug Geldenhuys from Border (I think) who kicked Colin Meads exposed arm in 1970.
By the way I cannot open the link so haven't seen the Herald list.
I'm going to put in a vote for one of my childhood rugby heroes - Wade Dooley, more of an intelligent hard-man enforcer on the pitch than an out-and-out thug but not to be messed with. He basically so good in the old world of the lineout that they changed the laws to even it up for his opponents.
A couple of famous stories about him: not being known as a real athlete (6'8" brick outhouse that he was) we would often be needled about the athleticism of upcoming opponents, the standard response? "What's he like with 17 1/2 stone round 'is neck?"
The other story revolves around his rivalry with Paul Ackford who as an Inspector outranked him in the police force. Ackford was decked in a test match in Argentina, Wade's words of comfort: "You can tell which bloody copper works behind a desk."
It was Wade's absence from the Lions tour of 1993 due to the ill health of his father that gave one Martin Johnson his introduction to the top level...another famously able to get away with it in the darker corners..
A little birdie has just reminded me that Wade Dooley is now a citing officer!
RG - I always thought Dooley was big and useless, perhaps not so from what you say.
Obviously he will know where to look for the dirty play.
You can add the Lion Simon Shaw to the list after kneeing Fourie du Preez in the back last night.
pdm - I watched the replay of the Lions game, and can only conclude that Shaw was very lucky not to be red-carded, especially with Stu Dickinson in charge. Wasn't it him that got sent off at Eden Park a few years ago for use of the knee?
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