[?]Orisi Dawai

Is Dead

Orisi Dawai, Fijian soldier-sports nan, died on November 25 in .ancashire, 13,000 miles from his \ative land. He had lived there for \ve years in the “winter” Of a pectacular career in Rugby football. )RISI, only 36, was a double international; he represented Fiji s a sprinter at the 1950 Empire rames at Auckland, and from 1954 n he was always one of the first hosen in Fijian Rugby teams.

Between those two careers Orisi mdwiched in two years as a soldier r ith the Fiji battalion in Malaya.

His best Rugby seasons were robably 1956 and 1957, although icre were glimmerings of his latent bility in succeeding years till he left iji.

It was as a centre that he really lone; his speed, ability to size up situation quickly and capitalise on , and utter unselfishness in the iterests of his team, put him in the »p bracket.

Orisi captained Fiji against the attalion when it returned from lalaya in 1956. He captained the ijian team in New Zealand in 1957, id toured Tonga in 1958. He fell om grace a little that year, probably scause he did not show his best form i the early part of the season.

But Orisi was a big man and it iok several hard games to get him to his best playing condition, a lint which the selectors seemed to /erlook.

He was back as captain of Fiji in 1959, against the touring Tongans, and in 1961 he led the Fijian team in Australia.

By then his Rugby star was fading, but he considered he could go on for a year or two.

Apparently he had been negotiating behind the scenes to change oyer to Rugby League, along with a relative, the legendary Jo Levula.

It was all kept very quiet, and not till he and Levula plus a couple of other prominent Fijian Rugby footballers, arrived in England, was it known that they had signed on to play for Rochdale Hornets.

He did fairly well with a lowly rated team, but he was now into his 30’s, and his days as a footballer were clearly numbered.

He and his wife, Makareta, in cidentally the sister of another Fijian Rugby international, George Cavalevu, kept open house at Roch dale for any Fijians who happened to be there.

Orisi was always quiet and his success as a sportsman did not go to his head, as it has with some other Fijians.

He died too young and his passing

will be mourned widely.-

Norman

Baxter.

Drisi Dawai, as his Fiji fans remember him.