Rugby may be dropped
p. 39 · Read in the full issue
at Papeete
Rugby Union may well be scrapped altogether from the Fourth South Pacific Games to be played in Papeete next year.
At Port Moresby in 1969, Fiji handed out such a trouncing to the other sides that the sport was declared an optional rather than a compulsory sport in future. And now with the problem of transporting large teams all the way to French Polynesia with another trouncing ahead, many sides are dropping out.
Tonga, Fiji’s only serious Rugby rival, is not sending a team, and Western Samoa is having serious doubts. From the distance point of view, Papua- New Guinea will have to do some hard thinking if it is pre pared to send its side, but the Cook Islands, the closest of the other territories to French Poly nesia, has signified its willing ness to be represented in Rugby.
If Rugby is deleted from the sports at Papeete, it will mean that more contestants can enter smaller events such as spear fishing and archery (two new sports for next year) and boxing, cycling, golf or judo.