A 150-year-old chronicle from rugby union’s foundation season is yet another exciting discovery for auctioneers
The last Saturday this month will mark the 150th anniversary of the first international match played in rugby union. It was between Scotland and England at Raeburn Place in Edinburgh, with the home side winning by one goal and a try to a try. Each side had 20 players, most of them forwards, and if last year’s autumn series was hardly an advertisement for adventure, it was an attacking orgy compared to what was served up in the game’s formative years.
“The early matches were dull affairs with the ball rarely reaching the backs, whose chief responsibility was to defend,” wrote the historian John Griffiths in his book on the history of international rugby union. Some things have not changed in a century and a half, although the diet for players then in the buildup to a game of underdone beef and beer has rather fallen out of favour and matches are played over two halves of 40 rather than 50 minutes.
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