The Daily Telegraph

John Faull

Hard-tackling and versatile Wales No 8 and British and Irish Lion praised as a ‘true gentleman’

- John Faull, born June 30 1933, died June 21 2017

JOHN FAULL, who has died aged 83, was a member of the talented British and Irish Lions team of 1959 that beat the All Blacks at Eden Park in Auckland – scene of this morning’s Test match – for the first time since 1930, only their second victory there in 60 years; he was capped 12 times by Wales between 1957 and 1960, winning seven and drawing one of his first 10 internatio­nals.

He had first faced New Zealand aged 20 in only his third game for Swansea, kicking the two long-range penalty goals that drew the match six-all. Although he went on to win all his internatio­nal caps as a No 8, Swansea used his size and pace as a disruptive, hard-tackling centre three-quarter. He played that game and 20 others that season as a try-scoring and goal-kicking centre. His versatilit­y was such that during his National Service the Royal Navy played him at full-back.

He played his first game for Wales against Ireland on an unusually muddy pitch at Cardiff Arms Park in March 1957. The mud not only nullified Ireland’s sprightly backs, such as Jackie Kyle and Tony O’reilly, but made it impossible for the referee to work out which side was which. In the end he sent both teams to the dressing-room to put on clean shirts.

In his second internatio­nal at Stade Colombes in Paris, Faull scored one of four Welsh tries in the Principali­ty’s last victory over France for 14 years. In his first game against England at Twickenham the following year he was partnered in the back row by his Swansea colleague, Clem Thomas, who captained Wales for that season and the next.

He was startled to turn round during the game to find his captain “kicking his bum to get him going”, as Thomas later described the incident. “After that he played a blinder.” Clem said he was copying the tactic of an earlier Welsh captain, John Gwilliam, later a headmaster, who, when things seemed to be going against his pack, would “run up, hit them on the backside, and tell them not to play like silly boys”.

John Faull was born at Morriston, near Swansea, on June 30 1933. His father, Wilfred, became an internatio­nal rugby referee and was later president of the Welsh Rugby Union. He was educated at Bromsgrove School and went into the steel industry, later becoming a company director.

On the tour of Australia and New Zealand in 1959, the high point of his career, Faull was, at 15 stone 10lbs, the heaviest member of the squad, and at 6ft 3in, the second tallest (after David Marques, the England lock). In contrast, about 20 of the current Lions squad are over 17 stone and one or two are close to 20 stone; several are over 6ft 6in tall.

He scored 60 points on the tour, including two tries in Sydney in the opening game in Australia. He played in one Test against the Wallabies, which the Lions won 17-6 in Brisbane. He had also been on the winning side against Australia for the Barbarians in 1958. He was chosen for three of the four Tests against the All Blacks on the 1959 tour.

He played 211 games for Swansea, scoring 359 points. In 1960 he played for the club against the Springbok touring team. In the 1962-63 season he was captain of the Swansea club, which described him on his death as “a true gentleman and one of the very greatest of the All-whites”.

On his return from the 1959 Lions tour he married Anne Munday, with whom he had a son and two daughters. He died after a long illness at Old Wall, Gower, where he had lived for many years.

 ??  ?? Faull (in the centre) for Swansea against Llanelli in 1962
Faull (in the centre) for Swansea against Llanelli in 1962

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United Kingdom