User:Shudde/sandbox2
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[edit] Early life
Billy Wallace was born William Joseph Wallace in Mulgrave Street, Wellington on 2 August 1878. He attended Thorndon school before moving to Mount Cook school. His interest in rugby was first sparked when on 12 May 1888 when he saw Andrew Stoddard’s British Isles rugby team ride past him in their carriage down Manners Street in Wellington. Stoddard’s team played Wellington later that day at the Basin Reserve as part of their tour of New Zealand and Australia. Wallace went to the match that day, and was after that hooked on rugby.[1]
Wallace played his first formal rugby match in 1890, and the next year he played in the Mount Cook school team where he played his first match at fullback. In both 1892 and 1893 he played in the Wellington Public Schools representative team. When 16 he joined the pioneers team in Thorndon, and the next year started playing third grade rugby with the Poneke Club. With his Poneke team he won their competition final 3–0 against Selwyn, and instead of attempting to play higher grade rugby the following year stayed with his team and friends. Wallace was nearly forced to play at a higher grade after some rugby administrators heard of his talents, but after getting tipped off that he was going to be observed playing in what was supposed to be a surprise visit, Wallace played very poorly until 30 minutes into the match when he saw the committee men leave. After that he found his form and helped his team recover to win the match.[2]
[edit] Rugby career
[edit] Provincial selection
In 1897 Wallace was promoted to the Poneke senior side, and was that year chosen to represent Wellington against Auckland. He played the match at centre and kicked his first ever representative points with a drop goal.[3] The Otago spectators shouted “Butchers” and “Slaughterers” at the Wellington players who won the match 10–6.[4]
The following year Wallace broke his left leg, just above the ankle, and later that year he also broke several of his fingers when fielding a kick.[4] Then in 1899 he dislocated his shoulder when playing for Wellington against Wairarapa. Wallace spent a year in Dunedin in 1900 to study as an apprentice iron moulder, and was chosen for the Otago team. [5] While on their northern tour, Otago faced Wellington, and when down 8–6 had a conversion opportunity that if kicked, would have drawn the scores at 8–8. Wallace missed the kick and was accused by some of doing it intentionally to give his old team the win. The Otago manager, Barney Campbell, completely cleared his of blame at the team dinner that evening.[6]
