1978 Kangaroo tour

The 1978 Kangaroo tour of Great Britain and France comprised the Australia national rugby league team's fourteenth tour of Great Britain and ninth tour of France, and took place from September to December 1978. Coached by Frank Stanton and captained by Bob Fulton, the Australian team, also known as the Kangaroos, played a match against Wales before contesting the Ashes series against Great Britain, winning the third and deciding Test match. The tourists then moved on to France where they were narrowly beaten in both Tests, the last series the Kangaroos would lose until 2005. In addition to these six internationals, the Australians played sixteen other matches against local club and representative sides in both countries. The 1978 Kangaroo tour followed the tour of 1973 while the next tour would be staged in 1982.

The 1978 Kangaroo tour was the first since 1973 and took place in the wake of Australia's rugby league season. Sydney's 1978 NSWRFL season, which contributed the vast majority of the tourists, ended later in the year than usual as it involved a grand final replay. For the English the tour was conducted during the first half of the 1978–79 Northern Rugby Football League season.

The Australian team's coach was Frank Stanton, who had already taken the City, New South Wales and the Manly-Warringah teams to victory in all of their respective competitions that year. Eastern Suburbs's captain (and former Manly premiership captain under Stanton in 1976), Bob Fulton, was selected to be the touring Australian side's skipper while Cronulla back rower Greg Pierce was named as vice-captain. Manly-Warringah Grand Final winner John Harvey created some controversy when he declined selection for the tour due to personal reasons. As a result, his Manly-Warringah teammate Bruce Walker was called in as a replacement. Another Manly premiership winner Terry Randall, who had required pain killing injections just to take the field in Manly's tough finals campaign which saw them play 6 games in 24 games (2 of them, including the Grand Final against Cronulla, were replays played only 3 days after drawn games), also declined to tour citing exhaustion, though he later admitted regret in not touring. One shock omission was Manly centre Russel Gartner who had played two games for Australia in the 1977 World Cup. Gartner, a speedy outside back who could play either centre or wing, had scored two tries in the Grand Final replay, one a 70-metre effort where he easily outpaced the Cronulla defence despite having torn his hamstring a week earlier, was considered unlucky not to tour.

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