Author Topic: Sporting heros  (Read 4482 times)

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Offline Scunner

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Re: Sporting heros
« Reply #10 on: January 14, 2018, 12:55:27 PM »
Damn - I hadn't realised that the photo name came up when you click on it     :)    :)    :)

I really should avoid trying to be a smart ass :-[ :-[ :-[

Just pretend Barry John was a childhood hero of yours, you haven't actually said it is JPR :D

Offline Highlander

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Re: Sporting heros
« Reply #11 on: January 14, 2018, 15:56:07 PM »
It was Barry John   :)

Offline Colwyn

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Re: Sporting heros
« Reply #12 on: January 14, 2018, 16:36:37 PM »
Yeah, you cant fool a Welshman by pretending it was JPR. Barry John was the most sublime outside half I ever saw. He could drift through opponents like a ghost. I recall one international where Edwards shot his long torpedo pass across to John just inside of the opponents half on the right hand side of the field. John set off towards the far corner. Without apparently changing his step, he raced past the first defender (who was lining him up) on the right side and, without a break in step, past the second defender (who was lining him up) on the left, before running - hot knife through butter - to dive over in the left corner. Wonderful.

Offline Scunner

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Re: Sporting heros
« Reply #13 on: January 14, 2018, 17:01:57 PM »
You have made Colwyn all nostalgic, to the degree that he has let you off with your appalling Topic Title grammar. You could have taken it a step further with an apostrophe.

 ;)

Offline Stuart T

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Re: Sporting heros
« Reply #14 on: January 14, 2018, 17:10:48 PM »
Barry John - perhaps the best I ever saw. Certainly as a runner, especially given the coditions of the time - a horrible rugby ball and on nasty pitches.

Of course, he wasn't up against the players with today's physiques and fitness levels.

Plus the game was different then - all out attack!

Phil Bennet, Dan Carter - and yes, Jonny Wilkinson for tackling and kicking, were exceptionally gifted players.

Barry John does get my vote because whenever he got hold of the ball, quite simply, I expected something exciting from him and often got it.

However, I played at full back and JPR was my inspiration - far more than the curmudgeonly Bob Hiller (with whom I played when I was young and he was way past his prime).

Nice one, John. Thanks for the posting.


Offline Colwyn

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Re: Sporting heros
« Reply #15 on: January 14, 2018, 17:29:35 PM »
You have made Colwyn all nostalgic, to the degree that he has let you off with your appalling Topic Title grammar. You could have taken it a step further with an apostrophe.

   ;)
A mere trifle; just a typo. The lad clearly knows quality when he sees it.


Barry John retired at the very young age of 27 saying there was too much stress and expectation upon him. We build up our heroes and sometimes this destroys them as sportsmen.


On the nostalgia kick - this is what the historians of the official history of the WRU have to say about him: "his running, deft, poised, a fragile illusion that one wrong instant could crack, yet rarely did, was the art of the fly-half at its most testing. He was the dragonfly on the anvil of destruction. John ran in another dimension of time and space. His opponents ran into the glass walls which covered his escape routes from their bewildered clutches. He left mouths, and back rows, agape."
« Last Edit: January 14, 2018, 17:40:05 PM by Colwyn »

Offline Highlander

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Re: Sporting heros
« Reply #16 on: January 14, 2018, 18:40:52 PM »
Man was a genius on a rugby field Colwyn who played a remarkable low number of times for Wales.

PS I hope we are not in danger of being sycophantic with regard to Mr John.  ;)




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