News & Updates
London NZ to play match at Passchendaele
Published on August 15th 2007The London New Zealand Rugby Football Club will play a match against a French club as part of this year’s 90th Commemorations of Passchendaele.
The match, against Rugby Olympique Club Tourquennois, of Tourcoing in the Pas de Calais, will take place at 3 pm on Sunday 7 October in the village of Passchendaele itself and is believed to be the first time rugby has been played in the immediate vicinity. The Flemish Rugby Union is assisting with preparations and arrangements.
Campbell Rowe, the LNZ Club Captain, said: "To be invited to such an occasion is a great honour for our club and for us as New Zealanders to pay our respects to those who fought for the freedoms that we enjoy today."
Lieutenant-Commander Freddy Declerck of the Passchendaele Society 1917 and Commemorations Organising Committee said: "For us as an organization, sport is a way of teaching history and most of all a means of bringing people together to commemorate the ultimate sacrifice made by so many young men from all over the world. Dave Gallaher is a symbol of all of those sportsmen who came ‘from the uttermost ends of the Earth' to fight for our freedom. The sacrifice they made must never been forgotten.
"We know that teams played rugby behind the frontline," he added. "In fact, they even had a competition between the nations of the British forces. It was our dream to have a team with players from New Zealand and we are very proud and happy that the London New Zealand Rugby Football Club has accepted our invitation. For the first time we will have rugby in Passchendaele - in commemoration of the New Zealand commitment here."
LNZRFC, with a past stretching back more than 80 years, currently plays Division Three in the London competition and is a driving force behind the annual ANZAC Day sports tournament in London, which features large numbers of New Zealanders and Australians playing rugby, netball and Aussie Rules.
While in Flanders, the club's players and supporters will stay at the Messines Peace Village and will tour the battlefields of Messines and Passchendaele as well as visiting New Zealand memorials and cemeteries.
Four All Blacks and a number of Maori All Blacks died in Flanders during World War 1, the most well-known being Dave Gallaher, the Captain of the 1905 "Originals" who lost his life at ‘s Graventafel, close to Passchendaele, on October 4, 1917.
The major ANZAC Commemorative service this year takes place at Tyne Cot Cemetery, Passchendaele, on October 4 with an additional New Zealand First Battle of Passchendaele service on October 12, the date which became New Zealand's most tragic day in history. It remains so.
LNZRFC has a distinguished past and has boasted a number of All Blacks among its membership over the years.
The club was founded in 1926 with Colonel Bernard (later Lord) Freyburg VC as Chairman, but the Depression and World War 2 intervened and the club was finally re-established in 1962. In 1966 it moved to Aorangi Park in Wimbledon where it leased 12 acres from the All England Tennis Club. The club was then 700 members strong with five rugby teams, two rugby fields, tennis and cricket clubs and a bowling green.
In the 1970s, Aorangi Park was a home away from home for New Zealanders in London and a number of former and future All Blacks, including Doug Rollerson, Terry Morrison and Paul Sapsford, represented the club. The All Blacks Earle Kirton and Chris Laidlaw were vice-presidents.
With the expansion of the All England Tennis Club in the 1980s, the club was forced to leave Aorangi Park and is now settled at the Acton Sports Club, Park Place, Acton, London Today at Wimbledon, the new No.1 court and surrounding courts fill what was once Aorangi Park. All that remains of the New Zealand connection are the names - Aorangi Picnic Terrace, Aorangi Food Court and Aorangi Café.
Rugby Olympique Club Tourquennois was established in the 1960s after junior and cadet teams from local colleges raised the profile of rugby in the area by making it to the championships in their respective grades. Today the club has a full range of senior and age-group sides, including women.