PINCHING OF PLAYERS

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Volume 58, Issue 89, 17 May 1929, Page 5

PINCHING OF PLAYERS

A VIEW FROM WAIRARAPA. A COMEDIAN LET LOOSE. The following is an extract of an article nliich appeared in the Wairarapa Daily Times on Tuesday of tliis week. The reading of it will no doubt be thoroughly enjoyed by the Hawke's Bay ^ football public : — "The hnniorist wlio tries Iri =- hand occasionaliy at writing Hawke's Bay notcs for a iittle weekly print in "Welhbigton is very mncli disturbed at the tliought that Wairarapa will give Hawke's Bay a fatlier of a hiding next Jnly for the Ranfurly Shield. Hawke's Bay fans are very downliearted over Hawke's Bay's chances. and their conceit has been much liurt that Wairarapa, which. in bygone davs, msed to wallop the hide off Hawke's Bay with something of a B team, looks like 111cjeasing last vear's 13 — 0 score. ^ "Consequently, the Hawke's Bay C'lem l)awe urges tlie Bush Union to place itself under the wing of Wairararapa, so that the latter 'sliould be bctter able to combat that lean period tiiat is at present darkening the green horizon.' "Tliis is simply propaganda to bnck up the doleful, despondent denizcns of a distriet wbich draws its footballers from territory so cxtensive that irs liugeness would make even Auckland blusli. "Tlie Ranfurlv Shield may liave the borer, but not1iing_ stands ont more p'ainly than that the whTte plague has ffot a hold of Hawke's Bay football. and it will soon be back to tbat state 1 when it ranked, if anytliing, somewbat below even tbo standarcl of tlie Bush. And, as that liour approaches, it will quietly slip out of Rugby and joiu League, as it dicl before, and Rugbj' will be cleaner for its defeetion, the only regret heing tliat tlie big band of humorists who clieer our strenuous lives with tlieir whines and snarls about Wairarapa football will be lost to us, because they will accompany rthe lost children of the desert.' "A jiitiful wai] goes up from a Hawke's Bay writer that the Hawke's Bay /lll Blacks will soon be extincfc because Wally Wilson has come to Masterton 'in response to frenzied appeals.' Tliis Rip Van Winkle from that diteh water village called, out of politeness, T\ apier, is so used to recording thefts of players from other districts by Hawke's Bay, tliat lie thinks tliat when Tommy Corkill ancl Wally "Wilson came to Masterton 111 searcli of work, wbich Hawke's Bay is too poverty-stricken to provide tliem with. 3\fastcrton Tias stolen tliem from Hawke's Bay. Tlie poor misguided football fans who are unfortunately ccmpelled to live iii Hawke's Bay, because they would starve in otlier places where brains are required with which tO' earn a livelihood, really believe that Bill Irvine was pinched by Wairarapa. Bill was playing football in Wairarapa when Hawke's Bay fans were busily pinching players from the smaller unions. "It is anticpated that ne^t year the strengtli_ of Hawke's Bay football will have so improved tbat a team from tlie Buchanan Home will be granted permission by tlie Wairarapa Rugby Union to visit Napier and play Hawke's Bay for the Toothless Tinplate!"