Ranfurly Shield Match Savers: Wellington v Auckland 1920

The Match: Wellington v Auckland, Auckland Domain, 7 August 1920

Referee: Mr. C. Atkinson (Whanganui)

Conditions: Fine, with darkening skies

Crowd: 13,000

The Result:  Wellington 23 – Auckland 20

 The Teams:

Wellington: F. Malin, McCabe, Tilyard, Barker, Corner, M. Nicholls, E.H Nicholls, Fitzgerald, J. Shearer, Hughes, Harkness, Price, Wilson, Calcinai, Pearce. Emergencies: O’Sullivan, De Clifton, W. Malin.

Auckland: Kingston, Nicholson, Badely, Murray, Grierson, Laxon, Earlly, Singe, Lomas, Taylor, M. Hayward, Alexander, Hamilton*, Arnold, Grenville. Emergencies: Campbell, Moore, Sommerville, Ross, Johnston*, Molloy. *Waikato players.

Background:

The 1920 representative programme was the heaviest yet undertaken by the Wellington union, who were keen to aid in re-building the game and society after the Great War. Wellington sent three representative teams on tour during the season.

As holder, Wellington played 11 Ranfurly Shield games in 1920, losing it to Southland in Invercargill (re-capturing it the following year).

Prior to this match against Auckland, Wellington had taken the Shield on tour for ‘away’ challenges to Taranaki (winning 20-9) and Hawke’s Bay (20-5), and later would withstand defences from Taranaki again (16-5), Whanganui (20-14), Auckland again (20-3), South Canterbury (32-16) and Otago (16-5), before losing it to Southland (6-17).

Auckland were coming off an 11-11 draw with the All Blacks, followed by a 9-3 win over Taranaki and a 10-17 defeat to Bay of Plenty.

There was no unified Waikato or Thames Valley unions at this time, so Auckland also drew two ‘Hamilton Union’ players for this match.

Similarly, Auckland had been playing for a couple of seasons under a handful of ‘amended rules’, which weren’t universally approved by the NZRU, so their players had to adapt to conform when meeting provincial opposition. These rules included the kick-into-touch rule whereby the ball could only be kicked into touch on the full from inside the 22 (the current rule) and not from anywhere on the field, the creation of an offside line at the back of scrums so that the wing forward or any other forward in support could not advance until the attacking halfback had the ball in his hands and the referee or wing forward putting the ball into the scrum.

Match notes:

Wellington had successfully defended the Ranfurly Shield against Auckland the previous year in Wellington, winning 24-3 and had beaten them twice in 1918.

Achieving this four-peat of victories over them wasn’t going to be easy, and the match once underway quickly became a battle between the two evenly matches forward packs.

Wellington would win through a combination of better handling and committed work on defence, led by 75-game captain and lineout specialist Arthur ‘Ranji’ Wilson.

Auckland came out all guns blazing and scored two tries to lead 8-0 approaching halftime.

Wellington hit back on the stroke of halftime with a try to Poneke hooker Umberto Calcinai, his first of the match. Auckland led 8-3 at the turnaround.

Skipper Wilson scored from a forwards rush for Wellington early in the second half to level it up to 8-8.

A brilliant piece of chasing up by Calcinai resulted in Wellington sensationally taking the lead. A shot at goal by halfback Ginger Nicholls hit the uprights, but Calcinai chased up hard and collected the loose ball and dived over to score to make it 13-8 to Wellington.

Auckland replied with a pot to Kingston (worth 4 points) to close it up to 13-12, before Wellington pulled ahead again with a try to the other Poneke hooker Ned Hughes.

Wellington broke out once more and University wing Nordon Barker scored to put them ahead 23-12.

In a frenetic finish, Auckland roared back to score with a penalty to Laxon and a try to Taylor. But they left their run too late and Wellington held on for a 23-20 win.

Aftermath:

The teams went separate ways for the next three weeks. Wellington played and lost heavily to the returning All Blacks from Australia (3-38) and beat Taranaki and Whanganui.

Wellington and Auckland met a second time for the season in Wellington on 4 September and the Ranfurly Shield was back on the line. This time Wellington’s victory was comfortable, two-try hero from the Auckland match Calcinai scoring one of four tries in a 20-3 win.

Wellington and the Ranfurly Shield then went on their South Island tour, relinquishing the Ranfurly Shield to Southland in Invercargill on 15 September. They finished their busy season with a 16-13 win over Canterbury in Christchurch on 18 September.

Pioneers of rugby in Wellington 020: Nathanial ‘Ranji’ Arthur Wilson