Editorial: Events of 1986 have their place

A lot can happen in a quarter of a century, as shown by the outpouring of sentiment at the passing of former All Blacks captain and New Zealand rugby union chairman Jock Hobbs.

The great Colin Meads called him one of New Zealand's greatest sports administrators. A great player and All Black captain, pretty popular in Canterbury for helping win and defend the Ranfurly Shield. We all know that. Well-earned.

Put this up against the vilification he and 30 other top players endured in 1986 when they made the infamous Cavaliers rebel tour - an All Black team, our sporting heroes, defying what was purported to be the view of the nation vetoing any sports contact with the race-segregational political regime of South Africa.

A flick also at the court which the previous year determined they could not go as representatives of the New Zealand Rugby Union.

All 31, including M J B Hobbs, were banned, by the union, for two games, missing the test against France which was then won by a bunch of squirts nicknamed the Baby Blacks, and the first test of a home series against the Wallabies.

Good grief. What on earth was everyone thinking? These were amateur sportsmen, on whom fans preyed as the source of their weekend adrenalin buzz, and an excuse to charge their glasses in the appropriate manner.

Hobbs had seriously considered giving up his top career in its infancy because of the difficulty mixing day job, playing rugby, duty to family - not a problem for the modern-day All Black who gets paid more than the entire Cavaliers team might have earned, had even the wildest rumours at the time been fact.

Reflection this week that he later regretted making the tour, thus, has to be put in context.

It was a consequence of the hour-11 realisation they'd been conned - the Cavaliers were never going to win those four tests, of which Jock Hobbs was captain in three.

He was the most unlikely of people to whinge, but he did, and commented: "I don't think I've ever criticised a referee publicly, and hope I would do so under only the most extreme circumstances ... For the sake of our own credibility we needed to secure victory to prove we weren't there simply on holiday."

Nothing compared to the South African psyche at the time, a matter of national importance that their team, politically banned from playing around the world, would beat the best team that was allowed to play. The generation which remembers 1995 and Suzie the tea lady might get the drift.

What is now important with regard to Jock Hobbs' subtle legacy is that we may put in context the events of 1986.

South Africans openly agreed with Cavaliers' players concerns, and were embarrassed - if that's what they had to do to win.

While it was the turning point in rugby, there must be recognition of what the tour achieved in also hastening a South African rethink of the apartheid rule of segregation and denial based on race.

At home, fewer than 14 months later, the All Blacks won the first Rugby World Cup. Suddenly, all was forgotten, and our rugby heroes were real men again.