PETER JACKSON

THE MAN TRULY IN THE KNOW

Try machine: John Gallagher scores against Fiji in the 1987 World Cup

As the first Englishman to win the World Cup and the only one to retire unbeaten, John Gallagher made the most implausible of journeys – from Old Askeans to the All Blacks via Blackheath.
If that sounds the tallest of tall stories, the Test record behind his stratospheric rise has a similarly fanciful ring to it: Played 18, Won 17, Drawn 1, Lost 0. As one of the few who has been there and done it, the Anglo-Irish Londoner from Lewisham knows how to find a way to the summi...