Peter Jackson: The day Newport felled the ‘Pinetree’
A colossus even among such contemporary giants as Frik du Preez, Meads ran roughshod over anyone who stood in his way anywhere in Europe except for Rodney Parade on a wet Wednesday so long ago that it happened some three weeks before President Kennedy’s assassination in Dallas.
Meads survived his experience and now, more than half a century later at the age of 80, the ultimate Enforcer is in the throes of a fight like no other. The medical bulletin from Waikato Hospital leaves no doubt about the gravity of his condition, that the hitherto indestructible ‘Pinetree’ has been felled by pancreatic cancer.
In such circumstances what happened at Newport is a piffling triviality except that in Meads’ book losing a ‘game of footy’ is a cardinal sin, bad enough in the Test arena, a thousand times worse when inflicted by a club team.
He recovered, of course, to leave an indelible mark on the game across the globe and other marks of a physical or psychological nature on some of those whom he roughed up. Meads hit with the pulverising force of a Sherman Tank.
Clive Rowlands, for one, says he can still feel the effects. Captain of Wales on debut against New Zealand in 1963 when they were still smarting over the Newport result, he called a mark in the days when catch, call and heel in the ground had to be synchronised to perfection.
Rowlands did all three to the referee’s satisfaction when Meads smashed into him from behind. ‘Top Cat’ recorded the incident for posterity some 40 years later as follows: “I was paralysed for a short period and many years later I was operated on for a fusion of a lumbar disc. To this day I suffer pain from that blow.”
Meads got away with it then because referees not only turned a blind eye more often than not but they were almost encouraged to do so rather than rock the boat and leave the Unions with a diplomatic incident.
At least Wales got a penalty out of it which was more than the Wallabies got for the most gruesome incident of Meads’ career, the one at the Sydney Cricket Ground in June 1968 which finished Ken Catchpole as arguably the best scrum-half of a decade including a young Gareth Edwards.
In an era of permissive refereeing, the short arm of the law caught up with him just once, against Scotland when Irish referee Kevin Kelleher found the courage to send him off.
Yet for all that, Meads has long been revered the world over as the first lock to harness raw power to mighty athleticism. How strange that the All Black who outplayed them all until Richie McCaw eclipsed his 133 matches should have lost the first one he played in Wales.
Perhaps Meads failed to grasp the sensational nature of Newport’s victory but it left him with a less than favourable impression of the Welsh game. “By nature the Welsh are much more demonstrative than New Zealanders,” he said in Alex Veysey’s biography. “They become madly elated in victory and bloody depressed in defeat.
“They are good winners. But they have this overwhelming pride and they tend to over-dramatise their victories, almost to flaunt them while they still have the company of the defeated.
“It’s an elation which becomes almost hysterical and it can make the beaten team a little bitter.”
Entire generations of All Blacks have had an innate excuse when accused of being bad losers, that they simply lack the practice. Meads may have been right in claiming they lost to a ‘skittery drop- goal’, John ‘Dick’ Uzzell’s famous low-trajectory skimmer, but he would have been just as right had he acknowledged Newport’s forward superiority.
Brian Price, their captain and Meads’ opposite number, recalls a staggering fact from that occasion which shows how the game has changed. “We did well in the lineout, we didn’t give them a kick at goal and we took eight balls against the head,” he said. Eight? “Eight.”
The late Graham Bevan, uncapped successor to the distinguished Lion, Bryn Meredith, was in the midst of an eight-season run as the Black-and-Ambers’ hooker. “In those days, hookers would always strike for the ball, unlike now,” Price, now 77, said. “Graham did an excellent job but he depended on the rest of the pack making sure he was in the right place. If Colin felt sore about our victory, he still had plenty to crow about overall. I played against him seven more times for Wales and the Lions and lost them all. He was then the best player in the world. What set him apart was his non-stop running all over the field and his intimidation.
“Intimidation was a big part of his game. He could dish it out and if you didn’t stand up to him, he’d walk all over you.
“Colin didn’t suffer fools gladly. He played on the edge and we used to pull his leg about the time he punched little David Watkins during the 1966 Lions series. And Colin would say: ‘That was the only time I could catch him!’”
Meads made sure for the rest of his playing days that Wales never had another victory to celebrate at his expense. Now his old British and Irish sparring partners will be closing ranks, united in prayer that ‘Pinetree’ pulls through.
