Patrick Keogh

For the Scottish association footballer, see Pat Keogh.
Patrick Keogh
Date of birth ca. 1867
Place of birth Birmingham, England
Date of death 12 March 1940
Place of death Seacliff, New Zealand
School Christian Brothers School, Dunedin
Occupation(s) Brass moulder
Rugby union career
Playing career
Position Half-back
Amateur clubs
Years Club / team
1884–91 Kaikorai Rugby Football Club
Provincial/State sides
Years Club / team Caps (points)
1887–91 Otago
National team(s)
Years Club / team Caps (points)
1888–89 New Zealand Native team 44 (54)

Patrick Keogh, also known as Pat Keogh or Paddy Keogh, (c. 1867 – 12 March 1940) was a New Zealand rugby footballer who toured with the 1888–89 New Zealand Native football team.[1]

Rugby career

Photograph of the Native football team and management
A team photo of the 1888–89 New Zealand Native football team. Patrick Keogh standing on the far left.

Keogh was born in Birmingham, England, and moved to New Zealand when he was young. In 1884 he started playing senior club rugby for Kaikorai Rugby Football Club in Dunedin. Keogh played as half-back, and gained a reputation as a talented player before being selected to play provincially for Otago in 1887.[2][3] For Otago, Keogh played one match against the privately organised British team that toured New Zealand and Australia in 1888.[2] Early in the second half of the match, with no score from either team, the ball was heeled loose from an Otago scrum and Keogh collected the ball before darting through the British Isles' forwards to score a try.[4] The tourists recovered to score twice after an Otago player left the field injured (there were no injury replacements). The British Isles eventually won 4–3,[5] but Keogh's play against the tourists was described as "outstanding".[6] It was rumoured that Keogh, who had missed Otago's first match against the British due to injury, had watched through a hole in a fence in order to devise strategies for the following match.[7]

In early 1888 prominent Māori player Joe Warbrick, who had played on New Zealand's 1884 your of New South Wales,[8] attempted to organise a private party of Māori players to tour Great Britain—later known as the New Zealand Native football team.[9] The original intention was that the team consist of only Māori players, however Warbrick was forced to include several non-Māori in order to strengthen the side.[10] Keogh was regarded as the premier half-back in New Zealand in the late 1880s,[11] and his reputation contributed to him being approached to tour with the team. Keogh was the last "pākehā" player to join the Native's team even though he wasn't actually a New Zealand native; he was born in England, but his dark complexion contributed to him being selected for the side.[12][13][7]

The final team consisted of 26 players and toured New Zealand before departing to Melbourne,[14][15] although Keogh was the last to join,[16] and actually played for Otago against the team prior to their departure.[17] They then toured Great Britain, Australia, and finally New Zealand—the trip lasted 14 months during which they played 107 rugby matches.[15][18] It was the first tour of the British Isles by a team from the Southern Hemisphere, and the longest in the history of the sport.[19] The team was also the first New Zealand side to perform a haka, and also the first to wear an all black uniform.[20]

Keogh became the star of the tour,[13] and played in at least 60 of the side's 74 matches in the British Isles.[21][lower-alpha 1] The schedule was grueling, with the 74 matches played in only 175 days.[23] They arrived in early October 1888,[24] and by late November the team was regularly fielding injured players due to the high rate of injuries.[25] In December the team played two internationals, against Ireland and Wales, with Keogh appearing in both.[26][27]

Along with Charles Madigan, Keogh withdrew from playing Manchester on 11 March after tour manager James Scott refused to lend them money.[28] It is unlikely that the players, including Keogh, would have much recourse over disputes with the tour organisers; they would struggle to access the funds to necessary for passage back to New Zealand without them.[29]

The tour was not without controversy for Keogh, on the Queensland leg of the tour, and playing against the state side, Keogh, along with a number of other players, were accused of "playing stiff"—intentionally playing to lose.[30] Along with three other players, Keogh was suspended while the accusations were investigated. The Otago Rugby Football Union (ORFU) was particularly concerned about the allegations, and eventually held an inquiry of their own once the team arrived in Dunedin after returning to New Zealand. The inquiry resulted in the allegations being dismissed.[30]

Keogh had played in at least 70 of the 107 matches on tour, including at least 60 in the British Isles, and 9 in Australia.[21][lower-alpha 1] As well as his 34 tries in the British Isles, Keogh scored ten tries in Australia.[31] His last match for the Natives was against his own province of Otago; he stayed in Dunedin as the rest of the team moved on to Christchurch. The Natives won 11–8 and scored five tries, with the play of Keogh praised in particular.[6][32]

Rugby suspension and personal life

After exiting the Natives tour, Keogh continued to play for Otago until 1891, but that year was suspended from playing by the ORFU after admitting to have bet on rugby.[3] The ORFU had launched an inquiry after Keogh's Kaikorai club lost to their rivals Alhambra, and several spectators proposed that some of Kaikorai's players had bet on their opposition. Keogh retired from rugby following the accusations, and along with several of his teammates banned from playing.[33][34] He was eventually reinstated into the game in 1895, but his rugby career was over. Outside of sport, Keogh was a brass moulder, and his later life was characterised by mental illness. He died in Seacliff Lunatic Asylum in 1940, after spending much of the last 20 years of his life institutionalised there.[13]

Playing style

According to historian Greg Ryan, Keogh was "unanimously regarded as the best back in the colony" and also "one of the most gifted, colourful and ultimately controversial figures of early New Zealand rugby."[11] While rugby writer Terry McLean wrote of Keogh in 1987 that he was "one of those rare birds of rugby, the genuine 'freak'."[35] A correspondent for Christchurch paper The Sun,[lower-alpha 2] lamenting a perceived decline in back play, wrote in 1917 that Keogh "was probably the greatest half-back the rugby world has ever produced. His success was due entirely to his versatility in methods. Neither opponents nor spectators knew what he was going to do next. He was the first player to bounce the ball on the head of an opponent on a line-out, catch it, and streak down the field. He was an adept in kneeing the ball over the head of an opposing player; he feinted, he hurdled, he kicked; his play was never the same two minutes together."[36] While a teammate of Keoghs from the Natives', George Williams, said in 1925 that he had never seen Keogh's equal.[37] William McKenzie,[lower-alpha 3] known as "Off-Side Mac", who played 20 matches for New Zealand in the 1890s,[39] said of Keogh in 1910: "Keogh is regarded as the trickiest and most brilliantly attacking back ever turned out of the New Zealand school."[40]

See also

Notes

  1. 1 2 The team lists for eleven of the matches on tour are either incomplete or non-existent. Therefore the figure of 70 appearances in total, and 60 in Britain, is only a minimum value.[22]
  2. ↑ The correspondent was annoymous but described as "An old representative player who is widely known in rugby football in New Zealand".[36]
  3. ↑ According to rugby writer Terry McLean, McKenzie was "one of the ablest and most original thinkers in New Zealand rugby".[38]

References

Sources

Books

  • Fagan, Sean (2013). The First Lions of Rugby. Victoria, Australia: The Slattery Media Group. ISBN 9780987500274. 
  • Grant, David (1994). On A Roll: A History of Gambling and Lotteries in New Zealand. Wellington: Victoria University Press. ISBN 0864732775. 
  • McLean, Terry (1987). New Zealand Rugby Legends. Auckland, New Zealand: MOA Publications. ISBN 0-908570-15-5. 
  • Mulholland, Malcolm (2009). Beneath the Māori Moon—An Illustrated History of Māori Rugby. Wellington, New Zealand: Huia Publishers. ISBN 978-1-86969-305-3. 
  • Ryan, Greg (1993). Forerunners of the All Blacks. Christchurch, New Zealand: Canterbury University Press. ISBN 0-908812-30-2. |

News

Web

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