Editorial: Great years of defeat and revenge

For New Zealanders of a certain age, nothing in rugby can ever quite supplant a test against South Africa. As they tune into tonight's match they will be disregarding reports of the Springboks' troubles and they will have taken the South Africans' sorry performance against Australia last week with a large grain of salt. They remember that Springbok teams have often performed indifferently against others, yet turned into the titans of old when they faced the All Blacks. Something about these two countries brings out the best of each other on a rugby field.

The contest is not always attractive or clean; it is normally hard, grinding, uncompromising. When New Zealanders of sufficient age think back on those contests they have particularly strong memories of the series played in New Zealand 50 years ago this winter, the survivors of which are having a reunion in Wellington this weekend.

The 1956 series was loaded at that time with memories of 1937 and 1949. Those were the years, as old fans need no reminding, that South Africa had beaten the All Blacks. The 1937 Springboks had done the unthinkable, which no Springbok team were to do again - won a series in New Zealand. It was not until after World War II that this country got a chance to avenge that defeat and in 1949 it sent a team to the republic that looked invincible. It was not; it lost the series.

So when the Springboks came here in 1956 this country's rugby pride was on the line as never before or since. A second defeat at home could not be contemplated. To national relief the All Blacks won the first test at Dunedin but the Springboks evened the score in the second, a rugged encounter remembered for the way the Springbok props worked over their All Black opposites.

Before the third test the Rugby Union council met and the New Zealand selectors made seven changes, one of them the redoubtable Kevin Skinner, who was brought out of retirement and put in their front row. They also introduced a young Waikato fullback, Don Clarke, who, it was said, was kicking goals from his own side of halfway. Once the match was under way, so folklore has it, Skinner sorted out one of the opposing props then packed on the other side of the scrum to deal with the other.

The All Blacks won and went on to take the series at Eden Park in a match notable for Peter Jones' runaway try and even more notable for his after-match comment. "Buggered" had not previously been heard on national airwaves.

Those were more innocent times. The 1956 series was untroubled by the apartheid already taking shape in South Africa. It was a period of post-war prosperity when New Zealand had a guaranteed British market for everything its farmers produced. Television was still five years away.

So much has changed. Apartheid has gone and South Africa struggles to meet multiracial aspirations. The Springboks reflect that struggle and the coach is reported to have labelled one of his players tonight a "quota selection".

Professionalism and subscription television were scarcely imagined 50 years ago. Today rugby pays its players handsomely from its television revenue and we are spoiled for the quantity and quality we can see in our living rooms.

Tonight's test in Wellington was not a sellout yesterday, nor was the previous Tri-Nations match in Christchurch. The Rugby Union must be concerned at the signs we can be satiated. It is time to freshen the international format again. Why not try to revive periodic tours with South Africa?

Tours develop a drama of their own that catches the public imagination and can be unforgettable, like 1956.