Reunion dinner brings together 1979 Christ College and Llandovery teams

Members of the Llandovery College and Christ College sides that faced each other in the 1979 Centenary match in Brecon met up again 45 years later at a celebration dinner at the Cardiff and County Club, writes Huw S Thomas.

A large number of players and replacements from that spectacular game - won 19-10 by the Brecon school - were present, old and fierce rivals now mellowed by time into admiring adversaries.

Christ College centre and future Wales and British Lion Rob Ackerman and capped Llandovery full back Aled Williams were just two of the many outstanding players present.

Ackerman, who was picked for Wales against the All Blacks less than a year after leaving school, had flown all the way from New Zealand whilst Llandovery wing Bleddyn Rees - a try scorer in 1979 - had winged in from the USA, two of the many to have travelled long distances to be there last Friday.

Present too, was Mike Francis the Brecon coach who plotted Llandovery’s downfall but there was general sadness that his counterpart Goronwy Morgan was not there, having passed away in 2023.

He was, however, represented by his son Huw who had played scrum-half for Llandovery College in both the 1977 and 1978 fixtures.

Another unfortunate absentee was indisposed Llandovery captain Shaun Parry-Jones but his vice-captain Rowland Rees-Evans took part in a question and answer half hour, alongside Brecon captain Simon Griffin.

Interviewed by BBC’s Phil Steele, both Rees-Evans and Griffin spoke with great passion about the privilege of being part of this historic fixture and how the game had created life-long friendships between Llandoverians and Breconians.

“Fierce, frantic and wonderful” were the words that the distinguished Times journalist Vivian Jenkins used to describe the annual encounter, himself playing for Llandovery in their 11-6 win over the Brecon school in 1928.

Writing in the Brecon-Llandovery Centenary match programme in 1979, Jenkins explained the mystique of the game and its everlasting legacy.

He insisted that the tension and pressure that he experienced before the game was greater than that he had known either as a Welsh international or British Lion.

“This time-honoured match between our two schools has forged a bond between the Old Boys of both that lives on remarkably in after years. Mutual respect, I dare say – ‘To honour, as you strike him down, the foe who comes with fearless eye.’”

On Friday night both Rees-Evans and Griffin relived the build up to the match, the Llandovery lead that was overturned in an exciting second half, the highlight of which was the decoy use of the heavily marked Ackerman, that led to a try by co-centre David Pitt.

There were fond, if blurred memories, of the post-match dinner in which the 1971 Lions coach Carwyn James - a former Llandovery master - expounded his theories on the game and the vital role that schoolboy rugby played in its evolution.

Well-fed and well-watered, the cohort of 1979 talked late into the night of victorious scrums and lost line-outs, dashing runs and thunderous tackles, the faultless refereeing of the great Clive Norling and the crowd that thronged the touchlines four deep.

There was, too, the huge appreciation - from one and all - for the work of the evening’s organiser, Brecon’s Huw Richards, who, with the help of Llandoverian Adam Hathaway, had brought together the boys, now men, of the two famous rugby playing schools, to celebrate that unforgettable autumn day on Saturday, October 27, 1979.