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Brendon Tuuta


Maureen T-k

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What a great evening packed with memories and story's. Guest appearances by Ikram Butt, Owen Simpson and Peter Fox.

Thanks to Joanne Fitzpatrick and Dave Downs for your comparing and interviewing, great stuff

Brendon was a star!!

Im Fev and im proud

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Did he say if he was staying for our match on sunday

Somebody posted on Facebook that he'd be there!!

Im Fev and im proud

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Did Brendon end up watching the game?

 

Good to see him still fondly remembering his time in Featherstone.

he did indeed Daryn, he led the team out and got a great reception. it was great to hear the "Tuuta, Tuuta" chant go up again

joe mullaney is a god

the only good tiger is a stuffed tiger

oldrover.gif

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Remember his first game at PO Road. He flattened a prop probably 2 stone heavier than him. His enthusiasm and spirit remained throughout his career with us. Great player great days.

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Remember his first game at PO Road. He flattened a prop probably 2 stone heavier than him. His enthusiasm and spirit remained throughout his career with us. Great player great days.

hull kr?

"I love our club, absolutely love it". (Overton, M 2007)

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I was watching a tries of the season thing on Youtube the other day. It was from the early 90's. Some great players in team (Fox,Newlove,Pearson etc) but of course Tuuta was involved in everything. I always remember his fearless running and tackling but I'd forgotten what a great passer of the ball he was. I wonder what the great man thought of Jonny Davies on Sunday....

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Love this wee story from Frank Endacott regarding Brendon. He coached him back here in Christchurch at club level (Hornby RLFC) and provincial (Canterbury).

 

"...But much of the attention was directed at Brendon Tuuta, even though he had only been on the field for a few minutes. When we signed Brendon for Hornby I told him if I was selecting a boxing team he would always be first in. But he must improve his discipline on the league field. Everything was going okay until the Thursday training before the Thacker Shield when I went around the players individually, came to Brendon, and told him he had to 'harass' Runanga's Kiwi scrum-half Glen Gibb. Gibby was their playmaker, everything revolved around him, and it was vital he not be allowed to dicate play if we were to become South Island champions. Brendon looked up and said he understood what I meant. Just before the kick-off on match day I asked Brendon if he remembered his job and he replied, 'Yes, harass Glen Gibb.'.

 

The players went down the tunnel, Runanga almost scored immediately, and I was hardly in my seat up in the stand when referee Don Wilson's whistle had that note of urgency which makes coaches cringe. A scrum had broken up, Glenn Gibb was lying prone on the ground, and Brendon was trudging off for an early shower, moodily unwinding the arm bandage he always wore.

 

At halftime I went down to the dressing room, saw Brendon still sitting there, and began to give him a bollocking. 'Brendon, what happened out there? We're down to 12 men and that makes it bloody tough on the others', I said. He looked up in all innocence and said he had done when I had told him, to harass Glen Gibb. Suddenly it began to dawn on me. 'You harassed him,' I said. 'Do you know what harass means?'. Brendon was all earnestness in replying, 'Yeah, it means eliminate.' Maybe they have different dictionaries in the Chatham Islands.

 

A few years later Brendon did some 'harassing' of the Kangaroos in a test match at Christchurch's Queen Elizabeth II Park and the Aussie media dubbed him the 'Baby-faced Assassin', a label which haunted him throughout a fine career n Australia and Britain as well as for the Kiwis. Brendon was the toughest player, pound for pound, that I ever coached, fit to be ranked along with the guys like Quentin Pongia and Jarrod McCracken. Clever too. I remember a mid-winter trip to Hastings to play Waipukurau in a national knock-out competition. We had just returned to our hotel wearing our best gear, blazers and all, when Brendon and Ross Taylor decided I was going in the pool as part of team bonding. I asked them to back off while I stripped off, so my clothes wouldn't get soaked before the trip home next day. I carefully put my gear on the ground and jumped in to keep them happy. Then, as I'm swimming back to the side of the pool, I looked up to see my clothes going into the water over the top of my head..."

(Being Frank - The Frank Endacott Story (2002), John Coffey, pg 30-31)

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