RIP Tiny Hill
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He was hard as nails .
My favourite story of him as a player is Pinetrees first ab game . Pinetree tackles an opposition player , the guy is still moving Hill yells out “ put him down “ Meads is still struggling. Hill runs over and smashes both Meads and his opponent into the ground , gets up and says “ when I tell you to put someone down you better bloody well put them down “. -
The team will wear black arm bands in his memory in tonight’s game against Canada.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=12273016
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Anyone Meads was in awe of had to be a very, very special player.
Heard a story that Tiny Hill was photographed wearing shoulder pads (they were for protecting an injury) during a Lions tour and the Lions management/UK press made a big thing about how soft he was.
Went well, apparently.....
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@Victor-Meldrew said in RIP Tiny Hill:
Anyone Meads was in awe of had to be a very, very special player.
Heard a story that Tiny Hill was photographed wearing shoulder pads (they were for protecting an injury) during a Lions tour and the Lions management/UK press made a big thing about how soft he was.
Went well, apparently.....
Here is the explanation:
Hill was feared so much he resorted to wearing shoulder pads, not to protect himself, but to limit the damage he caused the opposition and his teammates at training.
"I have a long bone in the shoulder that points out," Hill says.
"I used to drive a wedge into players I tackled and my team mates would moan and grizzle about being hurt all the time, so Allan Elsom brought these rubber pads along and I wore them for the rest of my career.
He was a tough nut:
Hill was surprisingly dropped for the second test in Wellington, despite playing in Canterbury's 9-6 victory over the tourists. Hill believes his retaliation to an assault by prop Chris Koch was the reason he was discarded. Hill decided to settle things in the lineout.
"I said to Bob Duff to move up to No 2 and he said, 'What are you on about?’ I said, ‘just do it’, and when the ball went in I turned to Chris Koch and, whack, whack, I let him have a few.
"The South Africans immediately started yelling. But not Koch. He was on the ground."
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Ha ha! They were seriously tough in those days
Wilson Whineray did something similar to a Bok player I read somewhere. Meads tells he was having problems and Whineray said he'd sort it out.
Cue one Saffa groggy on the ground after a lineout and Whineray looking like an angel.
Not for nothing was he a Commonwealth Armed Forced Boxing champ.....
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The whole article is worth a read:
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@Bovidae said in RIP Tiny Hill:
A different breed and generation. Tiny Hill was a lock but at 1.88 m and 94kg was shorter and lighter than Rieko.
that's ridiculous, that's a cm taller, but a kg lighter, than my last year. And i was small for a club player!
born too late
(of course, Hill was light years ahead of me on the hardness scale. He would have called me a poof and punched me)
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@mariner4life said in RIP Tiny Hill:
that's ridiculous, that's a cm taller, but a kg lighter, than my last year. And i was small for a club player!
born too late
(of course, Hill was light years ahead of me on the hardness scale. He would have called me a poof and punched me)
Reasonably confident this isn't an isolated view by him.
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@MajorRage said in RIP Tiny Hill:
@mariner4life said in RIP Tiny Hill:
that's ridiculous, that's a cm taller, but a kg lighter, than my last year. And i was small for a club player!
born too late
(of course, Hill was light years ahead of me on the hardness scale. He would have called me a poof and punched me)
Reasonably confident this isn't an isolated view by him.
Just quoting this for anyone who wants to give it a second like
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This is a hate crime
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@Bovidae said in RIP Tiny Hill:
A different breed and generation. Tiny Hill was a lock but at 1.88 m and 94kg was shorter and lighter than Rieko.
Backlines now , probably look as big if not bigger than forwards in that era,
I remember as a kid in the late 70s reading the player stats, the heaviest guys in the team were usually the props at 16 stone , that’s 101 kgs
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@kiwiinmelb said in RIP Tiny Hill:
@Bovidae said in RIP Tiny Hill:
A different breed and generation. Tiny Hill was a lock but at 1.88 m and 94kg was shorter and lighter than Rieko.
Backlines now , probably look as big if not bigger than forwards in that era,
I remember as a kid in the late 70s reading the player stats, the heaviest guys in the team were usually the props at 16 stone , that’s 101 kgs
Plenty of tough, hard buggers in those days. And size doesn't come into it.
Red Conway of that era was 86kg and 5' 9" and seriously hard, Had a finger amputated so he go on tour to SA in 1960. Grant Batty at 70kg and 5' 5" was an equally hard bastard. You just can't get away with the sort of stuff they did back then.
Sad, as BBBT would have been in his own personal heaven.
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We use the word wirey/sinewy to describe them today, same as my dad and lots of other farmer types*. Not much mass but a lot of toughness and strength whilst still looking like streaks of weasel piss
*Does not apply to my lily livered, pansy hands, pencil neck self
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@Victor-Meldrew said in RIP Tiny Hill:
@kiwiinmelb said in RIP Tiny Hill:
@Bovidae said in RIP Tiny Hill:
A different breed and generation. Tiny Hill was a lock but at 1.88 m and 94kg was shorter and lighter than Rieko.
Backlines now , probably look as big if not bigger than forwards in that era,
I remember as a kid in the late 70s reading the player stats, the heaviest guys in the team were usually the props at 16 stone , that’s 101 kgs
Plenty of tough, hard buggers in those days. And size doesn't come into it.
Red Conway of that era was 86kg and 5' 9" and seriously hard, Had a finger amputated so he go on tour to SA in 1960. Grant Batty at 70kg and 5' 5" was an equally hard bastard. You just can't get away with the sort of stuff they did back then.
Sad, as BBBT would have been in his own personal heaven.
I think the main difference now , it’s become a bigger collision sport , bigger frames deliberately hitting each other at higher speeds in the battle for territory, that is where the modern players would have the edge , just through basic physics.
No doubt the older players were harder in other areas , particularly dishing out a bit of knuckle and their ability to play injured . -
@kiwiinmelb said in RIP Tiny Hill:
@Victor-Meldrew said in RIP Tiny Hill:
@kiwiinmelb said in RIP Tiny Hill:
@Bovidae said in RIP Tiny Hill:
A different breed and generation. Tiny Hill was a lock but at 1.88 m and 94kg was shorter and lighter than Rieko.
Backlines now , probably look as big if not bigger than forwards in that era,
I remember as a kid in the late 70s reading the player stats, the heaviest guys in the team were usually the props at 16 stone , that’s 101 kgs
Plenty of tough, hard buggers in those days. And size doesn't come into it.
Red Conway of that era was 86kg and 5' 9" and seriously hard, Had a finger amputated so he go on tour to SA in 1960. Grant Batty at 70kg and 5' 5" was an equally hard bastard. You just can't get away with the sort of stuff they did back then.
Sad, as BBBT would have been in his own personal heaven.
I think the main difference now , it’s become a bigger collision sport , bigger frames deliberately hitting each other at higher speeds in the battle for territory, that is where the modern players would have the edge , just through basic physics.
No doubt the older players were harder in other areas , particularly dishing out a bit of knuckle and their ability to play injured .Ron Elvidge is the second one that springs to mind [right after Buck of course]
Gisborne Herald: Latest Local News, Events & Updates - NZ Herald
Website and daily print publication for the Gisborne region. Local news, events and updates.
The former All Blacks captain died in Auckland on Saturday, aged 96.
Elvidge famously scored the match and series-winning try in the 6-3 third test triumph over the Lions in 1950, despite suffering a bad collarbone injury and facial wound.
The All Blacks were down to 13 men in the era of no injury replacements, after the great All Black and North Auckland centre JB Smith and Elvidge had both gone off injured.
Elvidge needed four stitches to his forehead, and one arm hung loose from a damaged collarbone, but he returned to the turf of Athletic Park.
The Otago second five-eight moved out to the wing and scored the winning try.
He had also scored in the first test on his Carisbrook home ground.
Elvidge never played for New Zealand again.
“My memory of the game is pretty minimal,” he told the NZ Herald in 2017.
