Graduation bittersweet for family of paralysed rugby player

Hannah and Grahame Thorne after her graduation. Picture / Otago Daily Times

Seeing daughter Hannah walk across the Dunedin Town Hall stage to be capped was an emotional moment for former All Black Grahame Thorne.

"It would have to be the most bittersweet day of my life," he said after Saturday's ceremony.

As he celebrated his daughter's graduating with first-class honours in psychology from the University of Otago, it was with the knowledge that his son David was lying in a hospital bed partially paralysed by a stroke suffered after a rugby match.

Hannah, 22, one of 318 mainly health science and humanities students who graduated, was also "gutted" her brother was not able to be there.

"It's emotional. I'm a bit gutted. In the back of my head I'm thinking about David."

She was planning to move to Christchurch from Brisbane to be near her brother, who is now facing two weeks of assessment at Christchurch Hospital.

David, 20, was visited on Saturday by All Blacks coach Graham Henry, who took him a card signed by the All Blacks.

Mr Thorne said rugby players and friends from all over the South Island had visited David.

"The support's been unbelievable, brilliant.

"Even in the supermarket here, Dunedin people have been asking how he is," he said.

David's friend and captain Jay Wagner said at the weekend that the tackle that preceded the stroke was "a real unlucky thing".

It was Mr Wagner's idea to lure the 20-year-old to Nelson's under-21 Waimea team. The pair had played together since they were 15.

"I got him to come and play for us because we were short of players," Mr Wagner said.

Mr Wagner, playing at centre, was behind David Thorne, playing at fullback, when an opposing Huia Club member tackled from behind.

"It wasn't as if [the Huia player] came flying in, front on, and grabbed him round the neck or anything," he said.

"He jumped him from behind, lunged at him, trying to grab him. I've been pulled backwards like that. It's a bit like whiplash and hitting the ground all in one motion. [David] hit the ground with a big thump. He jumped back up, though."

Morale in the team had taken a hit since the incident, with at least one player unsure if he wanted to go on playing.

"It was an accident," Mr Wagner said. "That sort of thing happens in rugby every now and then."

- OTAGO DAILY TIMES, STAFF REPORTER