From the match programme:-
"Club Notes"
"There has been a notable improvement in our play these last two weeks, and the victories over the strong Bath and Birkenhead Park sides were both well-earned. There is more of the real fighting Wasp spirit about the team as a whole, and more solid scrummaging, binding in the tight and working as a pack by our forwards. There have been touches of the brilliance which was a feature of our early matches. All this should give us a grand-stand finish to the season, and the greatest hopes for a good show in the Sevens."
"The Bath victory was refreshing, and there was never a dull moment in the game. Woodward, in capital form, made the two tries scored by Bendon and Wills, and both were a just reward for intelligent backing-up Wills' pace is truly remarkable for a 15st. forward, and inevitably one wonders if he should not have been in the team earlier. His play at Birkenhead was scintillating, and he repeated his Bath manoeuvre only to lose the ball over the line. His tally of tries this season is now 21. For the record book it should be remembered he has been a Wasp since 1945, and the Vandals have done a good job with him."
"At Birkenhead Sykes and Harries were in first-class form at half-back, and Woodward, who scored a beautiful try, made a great impression with his clever diagonal running. The Liverpool and Manchester press accounts paid tribute to our team work, and made it clear how welcome we are as a club in the North-West. No Wasps could read such accounts without feeling a sense of pride."
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"To-day we welcome staunch old friends from NEWPORT, and it is bound to be one of the most attractive games of the season. How could it be otherwise? Whenever we play one of the crack teams from Soutih Wales we rise to heights which surprise even ourselves. Newport have paid us the great honour of choosing this match for the Annual Outing of their Supporters' Club, and if they all catch the train there will be a lot of them! The writer could not make out on the 'phone whether the estimated number of supporters totalled "700" or "some hundred." It does not matter at all. Newport can bring a thousand, or half-a-dozen, enthusiasts with them. They are as welcome at Sudbury to-day as the Spring daffodils!"
"Newport provide their usual quota to the Welsh International team at Dublin to-day, and we especially congratulate their great player, Ken Jores, on gaining his 33rd consecutive Welsh cap, and so equalling a 53-year old record in Welsh Rugby. The way in which this Olympic sprinter has played so much intensive Rugby and still avoided injury is a tribute to his stamina and all-round fitness. Malcolm Thomas is to-day's skipper."
"Our own team is rather a surprising one. Svrett, back to his old form with real vengeance, and Woodward are both playing for Middlesex in the County Championship semi-final match. Stirling, Yarranton and Hughes are assisting the R.A.F., and Hosen is crocked. O'Brien retains the full-back position; John Kemp comes from Lincolnshire to play at left-centre; Jackie Marker travels from Swansea to fill the berth at right-centre, and Stalder goes on to the right wing. In the pack Fred Herbert again occupies the hooker position, where he performed creditably last week. Wills goes to lock forward, and we have John Herbert available from Cambridge. It should be a rare, good game."
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"It is now known that a Wasp front-row forward, 25-year-old John Holman, was in the New Zealand train disaster on Christmas Eve, and has been awarded the George Medal for his gallantry at the scene of the accident. Holman, a local boy from Rayners Lane, emigrated to New Zealand with his wife, also a native of Harrow, last summer. He had been in our Vandals, "A" and "B" sides since 1946 and was a strong and powerful forward. (He had also played four times on the "Print" side in the annual Fleet Street charity match at Richmond, "Paper" v. "Print.") Holman and his wife were in tihe sixth coach of the train, which hovered on the edge of the damaged bridge before plunging into the swollen river. Holman was flung clear, and found himself standing up to his neck in water. For some hours he passed passengers over his head to safety with the assistance of another passenger who also received the George Medal. "As a result," says tihe "London Gazette," "only one life was lost in the sixth coach." Mrs. Holman was saved."
"It will be recollected that John Holman's elder brother, Captain W. M. Holman, of the Royal Artillery, who was a Wasp forward between 1938 and 1945, was killed in the Han River action in Korea in January, 1951. Two days before his death Capt. Holman had been awarded the M.B.E. for "ability, energy and leadership". "
"STOP PRESS - All our 12 teams won their games last week."