Remembering the Greatest Try
It may have been 50 years, but the potency of Gareth Edwards’ Baa-baas try in 1973 still lives on... as attendance at a huge tribute event this week is testament to. Simon Thomas was there...
HALF a century may have passed now, but the enduring appeal of Welsh rugby’s golden era of the 1970s lives on. Audiences old and new are currently being captivated and enthralled by the BBC’S second series of Slammed, which focuses on that triumphant decade, featuring evocative footage unseen for years.
Then, last week, some 1,100 people turned out for an event to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Sir Gareth Edwards’ legendary try for the Barbarians against the All Blacks at Cardiff Arms Park in 1973.
It was the biggest lunch ever held in Wales, with the main auditorium of the International Convention Centre at Celtic Manor packed out for the occasion.
Former scrum-half Edwards was joined by three fellow Welshmen who were involved in the build-up to his try – JPR Williams, Tommy David and Derek Quinnell, while Irish duo Willie John Mcbride and Mike Gibson were also in attendance, along with another member of that 1973 team, ex-wales and Lions wing John Bevan.
The event was tinged with poignancy, as others who played their part in that extraordinary score are no longer with us. Phil Bennett, who started it all off with those wonderful sidesteps, passed away in June of last year, with John Dawes and John Pullin having both sadly died in 2021. Another member of the team, former England wing David Duckham, passed away just last month. So it was a heartfelt moment when a toast was made to absent friends.
For those 1973 Baa-baas who were present at the Greatest Try lunch, it was a very special rugby reunion, an opportunity to swap stories and tell tales. Hearing their memories, the try of tries once again came alive.
We begin with JPR Williams, who first reflected on the historical context to the game, which had been billed as a rematch between the Lions who had triumphed in New Zealand in 1971 and an All Blacks team out for revenge.
“It was phenomenal really because it was the majority of the 1971 Lions coming together 18 months later and we just managed to hit it off,” he said.
“We had our coach from 1971, Carwyn James. He gave the team talk and we just turned it on. To be fair to the All Blacks, they joined in to the superb game it turned out to be.”
It took just four minutes for the match to explode into life, with Phil Bennett sparking the move that led to Edwards crossing, as he danced past three Kiwi players after covering back to collect a kick near his own line.
“We all miss Benny so much,” said JPR. “I played with him from U15s level, so I knew what to expect. I knew he was going to run it back.”
It was JPR who Bennett then passed to, with the great full-back managing to get the ball away to hooker Pullin despite being tackled round the neck by All Blacks winger Bryan Williams.
“Of course, nowadays, that would probably be a red card, a sending-off and the try would never have happened! But, at the time, it wasn’t mentioned. I was on the receiving end of four similar tackles during the rest of the game.”
Reflecting on the mindset that produced the try, JPR said: “We all realised the only way to beat the All Blacks – and it still stands to this day – is to move the ball against them because you are not going to win more than 35% possession, which is what happened in 1971 with the Lions.
“It was great that it all turned right. The amazing thing about the try was that Gareth actually started off behind our own goal-line, so he was accelerating all the while and took it flat-out. That made a huge difference.”
With the tone set, the game continued in the same vein as the Baa-baas won 23-11, with JPR himself touching down in the second half after an extraordinary prolonged passage of play to seal the triumph.
“We had no right really to play like we did. But Carwyn just said, ‘Go out there and move the ball’, which was always his message, and it happened. It’s amazing how if you are a great side – as we were in 1971 obviously – you can reproduce it. It was just a fantastic occasion.”
From JPR, it was on to Pullin and then skipper John Dawes, who sliced through up towards halfway before giving an inside pass to supporting flanker Tommy David, a man who wasn’t even supposed to be on the field.
David takes up the tale: “I had a phone call on the Tuesday before the game from Carwyn James, who was my coach at Llanelli at the time,” he explains. “Andy Ripley had dropped out, so Carwyn asked me if I would take his place on the bench. Well, I was doing somersaults!
“I had never been involved with the Barbarians or Wales or anybody at all. I was thrilled – singing, dancing.
“Then, of course, on the morning of the game Swerve [Mervyn Davies], God love him, dropped out through flu. So all of a sudden I was in the biggest game of my life. It was just a case of right place, right time.
“You are in the changing room and you are looking around and there’s Willie John, Gibson, David Duckham, Slattery, all the great Welsh
players. It was incredible. The Saturday before, I had played in the centre for Cilfynydd up in Cinderford in Gloucestershire.
“As it turns out, there were these people from Cinderford in the crowd at the Arms Park for the New Zealand game.
“They saw me run on and they were saying, ‘The Barbarians are picking from Cilfynydd now!’. That’s an absolute true story.”
Then, just minutes into the game, David found himself at the centre of the most famous try of them all.
“Before the match, Carwyn had said, ‘Look around you, there’s so much quality here, go out and take the game to them’.
“That try was a result of that. When Phil Bennett got the ball, everybody started running to the next lineout expecting him to kick, because that was the game back then. But, all of a sudden, he’s done these three sidesteps and we are away.
“It’s amazing the amount of people who have come up to me over the years about that try. I will get introduced as, ‘He was involved in that try’, not that I played more than 400 times for Pontypridd, had three seasons with Llanelli and went on a Lions tour!
“I remember a couple of years back a bloke stopped me in Tesco at Upper Boat to tell me he was at the game and that he still had the match ticket. It cost 30p!
“Then I was in Majorca a few years ago and this English fella on the next table was going through the try, with no idea I was sat just a couple of feet away. And he was getting the names wrong as well!
“It’s forever shown, that try. It’s crazy. It’s 50 years ago now, but it’s shown so many times, people think I am still playing!
“It’s great memories. It was a wonderful game with fantastic skills, but there is great sadness to it as well. When you think of the players actually involved in that try, Phil Bennett, John Pullin, John Dawes, all passed away.”
David concluded: “I have seen some great games over the years, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen another one like that and I have never seen an atmosphere like it in Cardiff since.
“That Barbarians match definitely changed my life. It more or less got me on the Lions tour to South Africa the following year. I feel so lucky to have been part of rugby history. I’m immensely privileged to have been involved in that try. Mind you, if I had dummied and scored, I would be Sir Tom David now!”
I have seen some great games over the years, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen another one like that and I have never seen an atmosphere like it in Cardiff since
Rather than dummying, David flung out a one-handed pass to his Llanelli back row colleague Derek Quinnell, who had been due to start on the blindside flank but switched to No 8 following the late withdrawal of Mervyn Davies.
“The morning of the game, I went up to see Swerve and he was lying on his bed,” recalls Quinnell. “I said, ‘Merv, how you are you feeling?’ He coughed and spluttered and said, ‘Awful. Pass my fags’.
“So I passed him his cigarettes and matches and he lit it up. He goes, ‘I’m not very good, no, no. Mind you, Quinners, this might be a good game to miss’. When you look back over the last 50 years, it’s been one of the stand-out games of the century really.”
Stooping forward to collect Davies’ pass, Quinnell then fed the ball on one-handed to Edwards, who was flying up on his left. Now for the tricky question. Was it a forward pass?
“I didn’t see anything in it that warranted questioning,” replies Quinnell with the straightest of faces. “The referee said carry on, the try was scored and that’s the end of it. There’s only one adjudicator on the field and that’s the ref. So Monsieur Domercq was absolutely right!”
As for whether it is indeed the greatest try, Quinnell says: “There have been lots of great tries, but for some reason, this has caught the imagination.
“I think the key thing is it’s worth watching. I still enjoy watching it today. Cliff Morgan’s commentary adds to it as well. Bill Mclaren wasn’t able to do that game, but what a substitute. Cliff was a great man, absolutely lovely and his commentary was terrific.
“The try and the game itself stands the test of time. There were some magnificent players playing that day, players who would have been superstars in any era.
“We were very fortunate to play in a very talented side and it was a privilege to play against the All Blacks. Enjoyment is the important thing in rugby and the game we played was one I thoroughly enjoyed.”
The final word, of course, goes to “that fellow Edwards”, as Cliff Morgan described him in the immediate aftermath of the try. He first gives his own recollections of the build-up to the game.
“The biggest fear we had was we were playing an All Blacks side that had been together for three months,” he said. “We knew the benefits of that, from our own experience of touring and playing against a side that had just come together a couple of days before.
“The last thing we wanted was a pasting on our own ground, so you live with this fear of losing. We begged the Barbarians committee could we have Carwyn to help us. They were a bit loath and reluctant for that, but they did say yes, okay. But he wasn’t allowed on the field. He had to stay on the touchline and shout orders and opinions from there!
“The whole thing was almost surreal. You are playing one of your biggest matches against a great All Blacks side. What was going to happen, will it work? We hadn’t worked out any moves or anything like that, we were just going to play Barbarians-style rugby.”
Then came the big day itself in front of a packed house in Cardiff.
“We always loved playing at the Arms Park. We were a part of them and they were a part of us and they were all hungry to visualise what had gone on in New Zealand a couple of years before,” said Edwards.
“So there was a great anticipation and, with the way the Barbarians historically played, people were looking forward to it. The noise from the crowd was almost deafening as we came out.”
That noise was to ratchet up several decibels just minutes into the game.
“It was a very frantic and frenetic start, as Cliff Morgan said, ‘A dramatic start’!” says Edwards. “With the try, it was a case of, ‘What’s happening now?’ To see it all unfold, I couldn’t believe it. I thought the ball was going to go into touch, I thought I was going to have time, I thought a lot of things.
“I was running back and, in actual fact, the move was coming towards me, which is why I put my hands up, going, ‘I am not interfering with play, I am just getting out of the way!’.
“On turning around, I was thinking, ‘My word, I had better get there as a scrum-half or they will be telling me I am unfit and all that’. So I just chased it. To say the rest is history is to simplify it.
“I had to work hard to get into position, not thinking about scoring, just to continue the movement. Then, of course, the fact I had to come from afar gave me a little bit of a head start, so I was through the gap and away.
“Now, one of the few injuries I had in my career was hamstring tears and pulls. So I did pray, ‘Please God, don’t let it go now’, as I was tearing down the touchline.
“When I scored, it’s difficult to explain what that noise felt like. Even though there had been loads of occasions when we had scored or done something good with Wales, that noise was deafening, so we knew it was something maybe fairly special.
“When I was coming back and all this crowd in the south stand erupted, I was thinking, ‘Oh, I wish it was the last four minutes, not the first four’, because we knew what was coming.
“But it actually galvanised us all and gave us that confidence to play the game we had in New Zealand. You couldn’t have ever envisaged or dreamt of that kind of start, but what it did more than anything was to set the scene. It got everybody in the right mood. The All Blacks entered into the spirit of it too, with some great moves and tries. You can’t overstate the satisfaction of beating them.”
Edwards’ try has followed him pretty much wherever he has gone over the past 50 years.
“You are fascinated by the pleasure it gives so many people,” he says. “Wherever I go in the world, people want to talk about it. So obviously it has had a big impact on my life.
“I have seen it shown all around the world. I have even seen it while fishing in Russia! It was in the 1990s and I was in the middle of nowhere, three hours’ helicopter ride from Murmansk.
“I was staying in this little village and I got to meet the local mayor, who used to be the commander of a nuclear submarine.
“One day he said to come back to his house because there was something he wanted to show me. When we got there, he brings out this DVD, shoves it in the telly and up comes that try! So there’s no getting away from it. There is a fascination with it.”
Lastly, the same question then for the man who actually scored it. Is it the greatest try?
“It was a complete try really, wasn’t it,” he replies. “Even though there have been some great, great tries scored since then, there is something about that moment, about that try that seems to epitomise what rugby is about for people. It’s stood the test of time.
“And don’t forget, now, we hadn’t been out there practising it all week. This was just the improvisation of players of that era being able to adapt to what was in front of them, moving the ball, having not prepared for it and seeing it work.
“I think that was the beauty of the game at that time and why that era still appeals to people now all these years on.”
The try and the game itself stands the test of time. There were some magnificent players playing that day, players who would have been superstars in any era