Swords Over the Fence

This year the Swords Club has achieved Victoria's only clear win in Inter-Varsity competition. This win is especially satisfying when it is remembered that the local club is by far the youngest of the four Varsity clubs and at most one third the size of the others.

That the contest was extremely close is shown by the fact that there were 170 hits against VUC, 177 against CUC, 178 against AUC and 181 against OU.

At the end of the morning it seemed virtually impossible for VUC to win. They lost the first match to Otago 6-10 and though 4-4 in bouts with AUC, were well down on hits. After lunch, however, they picked up and catching up the hits deficiency, won on the hits after a final score of 8-8.

During this time CUC defeated AUC 9-7 and OU on hits.

When the third and final round opened CUC had two wins, VUC and OU one each and AUC none.

The AUC v OU match was short in duration and AUC by their victory put them selves and OU, with one match each, out of the running. There were still two bouts to go in the VUC v CUC match and VUC with 9 bouts in were in an unassailable position in the match. They had however, to get 10 bouts to win the competition. The bout score was VUC 23, CUC 22. CUC won the second to last bout, making it 23 each.

Excitement was high during the last bout which VUC won on the last point after the score had gone to 4-4.

The final result was: VUC and CUC 2 matches each, AUC and OU 1 match each. However, VUC with 24 bouts gained first place over CUC's 23 bouts.

In explanation in event of two teams winning the same number of matches, the team winning the most bouts over the whole contest wins.

In a match between two teams there are 16 bouts. Should each team win 8, then the team with the least number of hits against it wins.

Each bout is for the best of nine hits.

The standard attained at the tournament may be partly gauged by the fact that the AUC team, which has been considered by the N.Z. Amateur Fencing Association good enough to enter a team in the N.Z. Championships, was last in the NZU contest.

During the last fortnight a quantity of new gear has been acquired and with more on the way, new members will be very welcome from now on. Anyone doubting the excellence of fencing as a sport should see those members of the Executive who came along to have a look at us in Auckland.

Our victory this year is largely due to the excellent work put in by our coach, Mr. V. St. C. Dickson, who though neither student nor ex-student gives up a considerable amount of his time to show us how it's done.

The following VUC representatives have been nominated for NZU Blues, 1946.

• Men's Hockey: H. Scott.
• Soccer: R. Dickson, B. Sutton-Smith, K. Johnstone.
• Fencing: B. Cato, P. Hampton.
• Harriers: C. Hawke.