RUGBY FOLKLORE: MYTHS LEGENDS AND EVENTS THAT MADE NEW ZEALAND RUGBY

Release date: October 21, 2019. HarperCollins NZ, 336pp, RRP $39.99. ISBN: 9781775541462 ISBN 10: 1775541460

Available now from your favourite bookseller or online retailer.

From superstitions to send-offs, All Black nick-names to on-field battles: Rugby Folklore is a miscellany of stories, quotes, and facts that are part of the fabric of New Zealand rugby.
New Zealand has played, celebrated and commemorated rugby like no other country. We took to the game in extraordinary numbers in the late nineteenth century. Rugby was the game for all. It became a sport in which names like Grizz, Tiny, Guzzler, Pinetree, Rimu, and the Paekakariki Express have made us feared and revered as the greatest rugby nation on earth.
Rugby Folklore is a book about matches won and lost, rivalries built and legends made. From on-field controversies, rugby songs, and what makes an All Black to Hika’s great try, ‘Bring Back Buck’ and wind at Athletic Park so strong that Don Clarke watched a ball kicked for touch sail back over his head.
Covering the earliest days of club-rugby through to the modern-day All Blacks, this collection of interesting facts, unforgettable quotes and tall tales will you leave you looking on our national game with pure unbridled pride … and a little disbelief!

‘Elliott has unearthed a copious amount of trivia, quotes, jokes and stats…There are compelling accounts of some great, barely remembered matches. And a rhythmic litany of players’ superstitions – Fox and Loveridge always put their left boots on first – is strangely compelling…A book for rugby obsessives – so it should find a wide readership, indeed.’ – Paul Little, North and South

Featured in NZ Rugby News December/January, 2019: ‘…an enjoyable jaunt down the ages…[a] valuable and interesting book.’ – Campbell Burnes, editor.