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About Phil Wilkins
About Phil Wilkins
Since going into bat for journalism as a Fairfax copyboy in 1958, Phil Wilkins has been a leader in Australian sports journalism, leaving an indelible mark not only in the minds of his colleagues but also on the sports he covered. From test matches, one-day internationals, cricket world cups and rugby internationals; his life has been spent on the road and in the tough arena of tight deadlines, whether it be filing a domestic one-day cricket match or from an overseas international. As a journalist for The Sydney Morning Herald, The Sun, The Sun-Herald and The Australian, his peers attest that he's never played a bad shot.
ELVs to stay for one more year at least
The Australian Rugby Union will continue the worldwide trialling of the Experimental Law Variations at all levels next year following the International Rugby Board's decision to prolong its analysis of the laws introduced to make rugby more appealing without damaging its traditions.
An anniversary to remember
Munster's win over the All Blacks in 1978 is the stuff of legend, writes Phil Wilkins.
Mumm's blood runs … black
New Wallaby Dean Mumm is hunting a start against his mother
country, writes Phil Wilkins.
New boy Brown at home among the Wallabies' pigs
Richard Brown grew up dodging razorbacks, now he's confronting some
of the world's most menacing forwards, writes Phil Wilkins.
Beale might have made the difference
Somewhere in the turmoil between the half-century hell of the Wallabies' Test defeat in Johannesburg and the personal anguish of their Bledisloe Cup loss to his native New Zealand in Brisbane, coach Robbie Deans thought about Kurtley Beale.
Wallabies must shed cotton wool to win
THAT titan of Australian rugby union, Alex Evans, arrived back in Brisbane from the coronation of the new King of Tonga in time to tune into the coverage of the All Blacks beating the Wallabies, and rued the opportunity lost.
Like Bok Bakkies, Horwill won't back down when the going gets tough
IT'S a fine strand of razor wire separating the legality of rough house rugby union from an act of pure thuggery.
Lomu the giant game-breaker in greatest of all Bledisloe battles
SINCE its infancy in the 12th century, rugby union has evolved from the "town game" for hundreds of ruffians on England's village greens to a sport for people of 120 nations, if occasionally emerging like a reluctant dinosaur from the shell.
Kiwis' latest cult hero is a throwback to the good old days
All Blacks hooker Andrew Hore will be a hard nut for the Wallabies to crack, reports Phil Wilkins.
Depleted and beaten but Wallabies rally with Cornelsen at forefront
Phil Wilkins ranks his top five Wallabies-All Blacks Tests in the countdown to Saturday's first Bledisloe Cup game for 2008. Today, it's No.2: Australia 30, New Zealand 16 at Eden Park, Auckland, September 9, 1978.
Get that up ya: Kearns's gobful cracks All Blacks' imperious facade
Phil Wilkins ranks his top five Wallabies-All Blacks Tests in the countdown to the first Bledisloe Cup game of the year on July 26. Today, it's
Frontline heroes hold up the heart of Test rugby
Somewhere on his property in Theunissen near Bloemfontein in South Africa's parched Free State, the only player to win two rugby union World Cups watched New Zealand overcome the Springboks in last Saturday's Tri Nations Test in rainswept Wellington.
Tackle of the century the final, fitting act in Bledisloe heart-stopper
Phil Wilkins has been asked to rank his top five Australia v New Zealand matches in the countdown to the first 2008 Bledisloe Cup game, on July 26. Today, it's No.4: One-off Test, Sydney Football Stadium, August 17, 1994. Australia 20, New Zealand 16.
Storm warning as Henry turns to Hurricanes centre pairing
THE Wellington Hurricanes have never won a Super 14 tournament, but New Zealand head coach Graham Henry knew where to turn to with the acid bubbling in the Tri Nations cauldron for tomorrow's First Test against World Cup champions South Africa.
Australia's ensemble thriller ensured series whitewash of All Blacks
Phil Wilkins has been asked to rank his top five Australia v New Zealand matches in the countdown to the first 2008 Bledisloe Cup game, on July 26. Today, he kicks off with No.5: Third Test, SCG, July 27, 1929. Australia 15, New Zealand 13.
Henry names a team to placate angry public and save his neck
COACH Graham Henry had one eye on the wreckage of last year's World Cup and the other on the blue blade of the executioner's axe hanging over his neck in announcing the New Zealand team for the Test against Ireland in Wellington on Saturday.
Front row seats to storming of the castle
THEY are the buried treasure of the game, the unseen batterers and rammers of rugby union, rarely seen, generally unheard big men whose grim presence and unfriendly muscle is all-important in winning World Cups.
NSWRU board's kamikaze attacks
THE NSW Rugby Union board must have a death wish, behaving with all the blind passion of a squadron of kamikaze pilots, hell-bent on bringing the Waratahs down with them in the Super 14 tournament.
ELVs come out to play on global scale
AUSTRALIA'S World Cup-winning rugby coach Rod Macqueen remains
optimistic that another year's trialling globally will lead to the
implementation of a number of the experimental law variations.
Paranoid androids up north have got it all wrong on the new laws
IT IS springtime in England and the land's rugby union
correspondents have spent too much time strolling among the
daffodils, for collective madness has set in along Fleet Street.
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