The Australia national rugby union team, nicknamed the Wallabies, is the representative national team in the sport of rugby union for the nation of Australia. The team first played at Sydney in 1899, winning their first test match against the touring British Isles team.
Rugby union is a football code within Australia with a history of organised competition dating back to 1864. Although traditionally most popular in Australia's rugby football strongholds of New South Wales, Queensland and the ACT, it is played throughout the nation.
Christopher Hobart McKivat was an Australian rugby union and rugby league player – a dual-code rugby international. He represented the Wallabies in over 20 Tests and tour matches from 1907 to 1909 and the Kangaroos in 5 Tests from 1910 to 1912. He is unique in Australian rugby history as the only man to captain both the national rugby union and rugby league teams. Following his playing career he became the most successful coach of North Sydney in the club's history.
Ewen James Andrew McKenzie is an Australian professional rugby union coach and a former international rugby player. He played for Australia's World Cup winning team in 1991 and earned 51 caps for the Wallabies during his test career. McKenzie was head coach of the Australian team from 2013 to 2014. He has coached in both southern and northern hemispheres, in Super Rugby for the Waratahs and Reds, and in France at Top 14 side Stade Français. During his playing days he was a prop and, in a representative career spanning from 1987 to 1997, he played nine seasons for the NSW Waratahs and two for the ACT Brumbies.
Arthur Cooper "Johnnie" Wallace was an Australian rugby union player, a state and national representative three-quarter who captained the Waratahs on 25 occasions in the 1920s as well as representing Scotland early in his career.
Colin "Col" Windon, was a rugby union player and soldier who captained Australia – the Wallabies – in two Test matches in 1951. By age 18 Windon was playing at flanker for his club Randwick in Sydney's Shute Shield. After serving with the Second Australian Imperial Force in the Pacific Theatre during the Second World War, Windon resumed his rugby career in 1946. He was first selected for Australia for their tour of New Zealand that year. Despite the Wallabies losing both their Tests on tour, Windon impressed with his play.
The first clash in Rugby Union between Australia and New Zealand took place in a test match on 15 August 1903 in Sydney, New South Wales. On that occasion, New Zealand won 22–3.
The 1899 British Isles tour to Australia was the fourth rugby union tour by a British Isles team and the second to Australia; though the first tour in 1888 was a private venture, making the 1899 tour the first official undertaking of Australia. It is retrospectively classed as one of the British Lions tours, as the Lions naming convention was not adopted until 1950.
Blair Inskip Swannell was an English-born international rugby union forward who played club rugby for Northampton, and internationally for the British Isles and later Australia. He was invited to tour with the British Isles on their 1899 tour of Australia and then their 1904 tour of Australia and New Zealand. He played a total of seven Test matches on these tours, and scored one Test try – against Australia during the 1904 tour. After settling in Australia, Swannell played a single game for his new home when they faced New Zealand. He was viewed as a violent player, and this made his unpopular with other players. Former Australian captain Herbert Moran said of him that "... his conception of rugby was one of trained violence".
Henry Eugene "Harry" Tancred was a rugby union and rugby league player and administrator who represented New Zealand at rugby league and Australia. He played 14 matches for New Zealand, 13 on tours of Australia in 1919 and 1921, and once in a pre-tour match against Auckland. He was an entrepreneurial businessman influential in meat wholesaling and exporting who together with his brothers, built Tancred Industries to become one of Australia's largest wholesale butchering firms. He was active in the thoroughbred industry as a racing administrator and racehorse owner.
The 1921–22 Kangaroo tour of Great Britain was the third ever Kangaroo tour. Again an Australasian side rather than an Australian team alone travelled to Great Britain to contest the Ashes. Coached by Arthur Hennessy and captained by Les Cubitt, the Kangaroos travelled on the RMS Tahiti to England for best-of-three series of Test matches against Great Britain for the Ashes. The tour took place during the 1921–22 Northern Rugby Football Union season and also featured matches against several of the clubs in that competition as well as other representative teams. The tour also involved some degree of player misbehaviour, with one young footballer almost sent home from San Francisco because of all the broken glasses following a drinking session on board the team's ship.
James Devereux (1887–1934), also known by the nickname of "Muscles", was a pioneering Australian rugby league footballer who played in the 1900s, 1910s and 1920s. A New South Wales state and Australia national representative three-quarter back, he played in the New South Wales Rugby Football League premiership from its first season in 1908 for the North Sydney club, before playing several seasons in England will Hull FC. He later returned to Australia and coached North Sydney.
The 1923 Waratahs tour of New Zealand was a series of rugby union games undertaken by the New South Wales Teams against invitational and national teams of New Zealand.
The 1925 New Zealand tour rugby to New South Wales was the 12th tour by the New Zealand national team to Australia.
The 1925 Waratahs tour of New Zealand was a series of rugby union games undertaken by the New South Wales Teams against invitational and national teams of New Zealand.
The 1926 New Zealand tour rugby to New South Wales was the 13th tour by the New Zealand national rugby union team to Australia.
The 1928 Waratahs tour of New Zealand was a collection of rugby union games undertaken by the New South Wales Teams against invitational and national teams of New Zealand.
The 1931 Australia rugby union tour of New Zealand was a series of rugby union games undertaken by the Australia team in New Zealand against invitational and national teams of New Zealand.
The 1920 Great Britain Lions tour was the third British national rugby league team or 'Lions' tour of Australasia, where it was winter and matches were played against the Australian and New Zealand national sides, as well as several local teams. In Australia, the three-Test match series was won by the hosts. In New Zealand another three-Test series was played and won by the visitors. The tour was a success and brought in a handsome profit.
New Zealand XV [1] 
