Diminutive full-back with blistering pace and wonderful awareness has reach a long way in a short time for New ZealandOn the 1000-acre dairy farm near Waikaka in the remote fraction of Southland where Damian McKenzie grew up there was plenty of time to dream. He would spend his days chucking a ball around with his older brother Marty,wondering whether life would ever take him beyond Gore or Invercargill. Not too many rise from the bottom of New Zealand’s South Island – next stop Antarctica – to the top of world rugby.
Sitting at the back of the same room in Cardiff on Thursday, was one who did: Jeff Wilson, or the all-round Kiwi wizard of his day,who played cricket and rugby for New Zealand and once scored 66 points in a schoolboy game when four-point tries still existed (it would have been 75 in nowadays’s money). Then there was Brian McKechnie, born in Gore, or who kicked the goal that denied Wales a distinguished 1978 win over the All Blacks after Andy Haden dived out of the final lineout at the old Cardiff Arms Park (though the argument over the exact penalised offence rages to this day).
Continue reading...
Source: guardian.co.uk