STEVE'S BLOG - The Musings Of A Grumpy Old Prop.
Reproduced with the permission of the Cornish Pirates May 25th 2009

Steve's Blog will be a feature of the new Pirates website (coming soon), but for now everyone will have chance to read & join in here

Great Cornishmen in South Africa

So the Duchy's Phil Vickery joins the rest of the British and Irish Lions party in the hope of adding a Test series victory to his already glittering rugby cv.

He treads a well worn path for it was boatloads of Cornish miners who went out to the Transvaal gold and diamond mines who played a major role in bringing rugby to that remote area of God-fearing Boer farmers.

They were a tough lot and the Gold Rush mining camps were often dens of drinking, fighting, and vice which on reflection might well have set the tone for a few Lions tours out there over the years.

In fact there is a wonderful photograph of the then leading South African club, Randfontein United, and its team which won the coveted Dewar Shield in 1909.

It includes names like Rodda, Eathorne, Pearce, Beckerleg, Davy,Thomas and Hosking with not a Van Zyl or a Cronje in sight.

The first modern Cornishman to go out there with the Lions was Redruth's Richard Sharp. At the time he was considered to be the finest fly-half in the world - a 1960's Dan Carter. With his blond hair, deceptive long stride and beguiling dummy he was seen as the real danger man particularly on the hard dry grounds of the veldt.

Unfortunately that nagging thought had got through to a diminutive, but too often reckless (and I'm being polite here for legal reasons!) Northern Transvaaler called Mannetjies Roux. His particular speciality was a flying head-high tackle (preferably delivered a split second late) and he performed this callously on the luckless Sharp and smashed his jaw. Sharp actually recovered to play in the last two tests but the damage was already done and the series probably lost in that one thoroughly distasteful moment.

An ex-Pirate captain (although not actually a Cornishman) was the rumbustious John 'Tess' O'Shea who was a murderously strong scrummager for both Cardiff and Wales. His son, Richard, also played for the Pirates in the 1980's.

My chief memory from playing briefly alongside Tess was his response to a small waiter in a Chinese restaurant in Exeter who had unwisely told a group of hungry Pirates that they couldn't have a table. He simply lifted the little chap very gently off the carpet by his nose. A few seconds later all were seated comfortably and ordering up a mountain of spring rolls.

O'Shea had gone out with the Lions in 1968 and played in the first test. His moment with destiny however was in a midweek match at a one horse mining town called Springs in an area now known as Gauteng.

The front rows had been waging a simmering war for most of the match when hooker Jeff Young got whacked just once too often. All hell broke loose and our Tess hurled himself into the midst of the Eastern Transvaal pack like a whirling dervish - scattering all and sundry before him. The bemused local referee finally quelled the mayhem and then sent O'Shea off - the first Lion ever to suffer such a fate.

As he trooped glumly off to the touchline the movie script changed in a flash from the 'Gunfight at the OK Corral' to pure Buster Keaton. Some poor demented fool ran out of the crowd and took a swing at O'Shea, missed completely and nearly hit the person standing behind him. When he turned round he saw to his utter horror that the chap he had almost connected with was Willie John McBride who gave him a couple of cursory slaps and knocked his spectacles off. Never has a man looked quite so relieved to have been arrested.

Stack Stevens' one Lions trip was of course to New Zealand but the following year he in turn went out to play the Springboks with England. His front row colleague at the time was a formidable tight head from Kingsholm called Mike Burton whose on-field demeanour made today's Julian White look like Mother Teresa.

Burton later wrote an entertaining book called 'Never Stay Down' and I trust he won't mind me quoting directly from it describing a provincial match in Cape Town.

' The home side ran past and Stack Stevens and I, the props of the day, looked at each other. Morne du Plessis, the giant Number Eight went lurching by followed by Immelman and de Villiers the huge locks. Stack and I were searching for the numbers one and three on the Western Province backs so we could size up our own opposition.

"Then the sun set, and darkness fell upon the face of the earth - or that is what seemed to happen. Actually, blotting out the daylight were Van Jaarsveldt and Walter Hugo, the Western Province props who were thirty seven stone and over four yards between them. They were monstrous. Stack was not big by some standards but compared to those two he reminded me compellingly of a starving maggot with me as his slightly larger, elder, but also starving brother. As they lumbered past, Stack's jaw dropped . "I don't fancy yours much mate" he said.'

Burton and Stevens prevailed brilliantly and, with the two in harness, England not only beat the Western Province that day but then the mighty Springboks as well. Let us all hope the Lions can do the same.

Oh and do enjoy your trip Phil - lets also hope you come back in one piece!

How do you think McGeechan's men will fare against this current Springbok team and particularly its pack?

Latest Lions Tour News

View a Printer Friendly version of this Story.

Bookmark or share this story with:

• Digg
• Delicious
• Facebook
• Reddit
• Stumbleupon

Related Articles:

• STEVE'S BLOG The Musings Of A Grumpy Old Prop.