Andy Hill was a painter and decorator by trade, never to more devastating effect than at Stradey Park on Halloween 1972 when his long-distance penalty painted Llanelli a scarlet shade of red and stripped the All Blacks bare.
Roy Bergiers’ chargedown try and Phil Bennett’s mastery may have been more widely acclaimed more often but Hill’s 50-yarder in the second half clinched the victory, edging the Scarlets two scores clear, forcing the increasingly desperate Kiwis to go for broke.
Andy never did get that elusive Wales cap but he achieved something unique: his goal ensured that, for the first and only time, Llanelli would run out of beer, embarrassingly so because the old tin town then boasted two major breweries.
“There were 126 pubs in the town at that time,” says Gareth Jenkins, the youngest member of the All Black-slayers. “And every one of them was drunk dry.”
There has never been a wing in either code like Andy Hill. A few oneclub men, very few, may have scored more tries, notably England‘s Alan Morley for Bristol and the Australian, Bryan Bevan, for Warrington, but none weighed in with more winning goals, more often than Hill, a footballing convert from Swansea.
“Andy was a phenomenal goalkicker, one of the first to use the round-the-corner technique,” says Llanelli rugby historian Les Williams. “The way Andy saw it, the longer the kick, the better and he proved that, under huge pressure, against the All Blacks.
“He broke every club record; the most tries in a season, the most goals, the most points. Over time some were broken but the biggest one of all will never be broken: 312 tries in 454 matches for Llanelli.”
Two of the world’s best, JJ Williams and Ieuan Evans, have had a go over the years. Neither came close: Evans finishing with 193, JJ with 30 fewer.
Renowned for keeping the rest of the team amused on long coach journeys home, Hill’s sense of humour failed him when it came to the national selectors, The Big Five. Despite statements to the contrary, he did play for Wales once, in October 1970 to mark the opening of the enlarged Arms Park.
Hill contributed two goals to a 26-11 win over the Welsh President’s XV. No caps were awarded and the fact that the 14 other members of the Wales team had already been capped made it all the tougher for Hill.
A few months earlier, when Wales held the Springboks to a 6-6 draw, he had again found himself the odd-man-out. That the selectors chose a fly-half, Phil Bennett, out of position on the right wing rather than a specialist left Hill ‘furious’ at the snub.
What little chance he had never came again, understandably so given the calibre of wings like Gerald Davies, Maurice
Richards, John Bevan and JJ. Yet for all their majesty, none could ever do for the national team what their compatriot had done for his club: beat the All Blacks.
Andy Hill died a few days ago at the age of 78 after a lengthy illness. He will be remembered in Llanelli and all points west as the finest painter and decorator ever to play for the Scarlets.
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