The heading should maybe rather have read “As kakpraat ‘n kolletjie was, was Billy Bush goed gespikkel!”

In line with the Maori speculation and accusations surrounding the 1956 Maori vs Springboks game, here is some more bulldust…

The rugby ruckus over a claim that a New Zealand Maori team were ordered to lose to the 1956 Springboks has prompted ex-All Black Bill Bush to ponder an incident on the controversial 1981 tour.

Anglican bishop Muru Walters, the fullback in the 1956 Maori team, insisted this week that Maori Affairs Minister Ernest Corbett visited the players in the dressing shed before the game and told them not to beat the tourists or the All Blacks would never be invited back to South Africa.

Maori forward Tiny Hill denied the team were instructed to lose and blamed the 37-0 defeat on poor tactics. Hill insisted Corbett was “never in the dressing room”.

However, Walters’ claim has left Bush pondering whether political pressure may have been brought to bear on the referee who awarded a debatable dropped goal that let the 1981 Springboks escape with a 12-12 draw against the Maori in Napier.

Bush, a Canterbury prop who played 12 tests, captained the Maori to the brink of a historic win. They were clinging to a 12-9 lead when the Springboks won a scrum with a minute to go.

The ball was flicked to first five-eighth Colin Beck, who let fly a dropped goal which Bush still swears “never went between the posts”.

Bush said the referee – the late Brian Duffy – was standing near him by the scrum “at an acute angle”.

“Victor Simpson and Eddie Dunn were underneath the crossbar and they said it missed. Colin Meads and Kel Tremain were standing on the embankment behind the posts. They said to me at the after-match function, `that goal missed by two or three metres’,” Bush said yesterday.

He said television footage of the match showed a couple of Springboks “jumped in the air” but most “went back to the 25 [yard line] waiting for a drop out. But the referee carried on to halfway and awarded the goal.”

“I was told by our manager Ivan Vodanovich on our way to the after-match function, `you’re not to say anything about the controversial dropped goal [at the after-match function]. The referee’s decision is final, that’s all you’ve to say about it’.”

Bush maintained a diplomatic silence to the media at the time, saying the draw was “a fair result”.

He now wonders whether “anyone from the [New Zealand] union said anything to the referee” about the ramifications of a Maori team beating the Springboks.