Kevin Skinner (rugby union)
As of August 12, 2010
Kevin Lawrence Skinner ( * November 24, 1927 in Dunedin, New Zealand ) is a former New Zealand rugby union player at the position of the pillar and second - row striker, and a former New Zealand heavyweight boxer.
Skinner went to the St Kevin's College in Oamaru, where he played in his last two years at school in the first rugby team and their captain was until 1944. His club career Rugby he began the age of seventeen at the Dunedin Pirates 1945.
In 1946 he took a break from rugby. For this, he worked as a boxer and won the heavyweight championship of Otago. The following year he was even New Zealand Heavyweight Champion. In 1947 he also played rugby again for the Pirates and was appointed on the basis of good performance in the national team of the Otago Rugby Football Union. Due to the local major competitors in the second row, he moved to the position of the pillar, on which he remained from then on until his career end.
With Otago Ranfurly Shield 1947 he won against Southland rugby. Otago could defend him until 1950 in 18 games before they lost the Shield to Canterbury. 1947 and 1948 he was also nominated for the national team of the South Island. His international debut for the New Zealand national team ( All Blacks ) gave Skinner on May 31, 1949 against the South African national team ( Sprinboks ) on a tour in South Africa. He played in all four internationals, which lost the All Blacks all, and therefore also the international game series. However, a year later he was one of the national team that defeated the touring British and Irish Lions in New Zealand in an international match series 3-0 (one game ended in a draw ). Again he played in all four internationals. 1951 and 1952 he won the Bledisloe Cup with New Zealand each against Australia ( Wallabies ) and put his only international match attempt. In the two games against the Wallabies in 1952 he was captain of the national team.
1953/54, he took part in the European tour of the All Blacks in which Skinner in all five internationals against England, France, Ireland, Scotland and Wales aground. He then joined briefly back from rugby because he believed it not being able to bring his grocery store in line. Nevertheless, he played rugby again in 1955 for the Pirates. In 1956 he moved into a farm in Waiuku in the north of the North Island. That's why he joined the club and went to the local Waiuku District RFC. There, he made it to the provincial selection team in the Counties Manukau Rugby Union.
His biggest success in rugby was the victory against the Springboks in the international game series of 1956 in New Zealand. It was then the first defeat of the South Africans in an international game series ever. After the All Blacks had won the first game and lost the second, and the New Zealand pillars Mark Irwin and Frank McAtamney injured, Skinner has been nominated for the last two games. He stabilized the front row in the crowd, which helped the New Zealanders to win these games. Even today, throw him many former South African player a blatant anti - sport, brutal slashed play, which he is said to have then applied to the day.
After this tour, Skinner played only on a small scale club rugby before in 1958 he finally ceased to actively playing rugby. From 1988 to 1990 he was president of the New Zealand Barbarians.