Rugby in the Olympics
Rugby is not
currently an olympic sport but long ago it was included. Here is the
full story.
Article 2488 of rec.sport.rugby:
Newsgroups: rec.sport.rugby
>From wft@math.canterbury.ac.nz (Bill Taylor)
Subject: Re: Olympic rugby .....the TRUE FACTS !
Message-ID:
Nntp-Posting-Host: sss330.canterbury.ac.nz
Organization: Department of Mathematics, University of Canterbury
Date: Tue, 5 Oct 1993 01:36:59 GMT
There have been a large number of "I-seem-to-recall-reading-about-this" posts.
Here at last is some genuine info about this olympic rugby matter, straight
from "The Guiness Book of Rugby Records", which I have *here* in my office,
alongside the keyboard, right now !
It has been laboriously typed in by me, for the benefit of all, (kindly send
donations to the address below).
[irrelevant comments deleted]
OLYMPIC RUGBY
Introduced by Baron Pierre de Coubertin (who refereed the first ever French
championship final), rugby was on the Olympic program at Paris in 1900, at
London in 1908, Antwerp in 1920, and Paris again in 1924. In 1928 the I.O.C.
turned down the request to stage rugby at the Amsterdam games. Three factors
were believed to be behind this: the IOC wanted more emphasis on individual
sports; women's athletics had swollen the number of competitors; and the
sport did not receive the backing that it should have from the British
entries. Both the Soviet Union in 1980 and South Korea in 1988 made attempts
to have rugby readmitted, and it should be pointed out that South Korea came
desparately close to achieving their aim. [* I never knew this! -wft]
THE RESULTS
1900 Paris
Three teams entered - France, Germany and Britain. France won the gold,
winning 27-17 against Germany, who were awarded the silver medal. Britain
lost 27-8 to France in the only other match, and were awarded the bronze.
1908 London
Two teams entered - Britain, the hosts, and Australia. Just one match was
played, a straight final, won by Australia, 32-3.
1912 Stockholm
Not held.
1920 Antwerp
Two teams entered - USA and France. The USA caused a shock by winning the
only match 8-0 to take the gold medal.
1924 Paris
Three teams entered - France, USA and Romania. Each country played two games.
Both France and USA beat Romania, who were awarded the bronze medal. France
won 59-3, scoring 13 tries including four by the fine Stade Francais winger
Adolphe Jaureguy. The USA then defeated Romania 39-0. The final was played
at Colombes stadium, Paris on 18 May 1924 and the USA took the gold with a
17-3 victory before 30,000. The Americans, from Stanford University, scored
five tries, (Farrish(2), Patrick, Rogers and Manelli), with a conversion by
Doe. Gallau scored the lone French try. The match finished in uproar, when
Gideon Nelson, one of the reserves, was flattened by a walking stick. The
American anthem was jeered, and rugby ceased at the Olympics.
Dual gold medallists
Daniel Carroll was a member of the Australian gold medal team in 1908, and
won another gold for the USA in 1920.
Morris Kirksey, gold medalist in the sprint relay and silver medallist in
the 100 metres on the track in 1920, was a member of the gold medal rugby
team in 1920. Kirksey failed by 18 inches (46cm) to beat Charlie Paddock
for the sprint gold.
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Now you can all sleep soundly tonight, content at last with the true story!
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bill Taylor, Math department, Canterbury University, Christchurh, New Zealand.
wft@math.canterbury.ac.nz
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Note that some at least of these teams were hardly national
selections. For example, the 1900 French team was apparently
just "Paris", the Germans were "Eintracht Frankfurt" and the
British the "Moseley Wanderers". In 1908 the British side was
actually "Cornwall". The victorious USA team is understood
to have been the Stanford football team!
Anyway, here is a summary of the games played and medals won
by teams from the various countries.
won lost for against gold silver bronze
USA 3 0 64 3 2 - -
France 3 2 116 53 1 2 -
Australia 1 0 32 3 1 - -
Germany 0 1 17 27 - 1 -
Britain 0 2 11 59 - 1 1
Romania 0 2 3 98 - - 1