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<blockquote data-quote="smartcooky" data-source="post: 399070" data-attributes="member: 20605">George Whitelock is a hard grafting player who works very hard in the tight. IMO, he cops a similar sort of criticism to that which Reuben Thorne used to get from fans outside the Crusaders area.&nbsp;Thorne would do the hard yards, the often unseen work in the forwards. Some used to criticise him for not being a &quot;ball-carrying 6&quot; but the truth is that the Crusaders tactics and game plans at that time didn&#039;t require him to be one. Thorne regularly topped the tackle count for teams he played for; and the blindside channel at scrum, ruck and maul&nbsp; was effectively closed and bolted whenever Canterbury, the Crusaders or the All Blacks had him wearing the number 6 jersey. The term &quot;Captain Invisible&quot; was coined by some know-nothing idiot sports jocks like Doug Golightly, however, if you ask the PLAYERS who played against the Crusaders or the All Blacks, which player they most hated to play against; most would say it was Thorne. Thorne was the ultimate &quot;Unsung Hero&quot; so his team-mates at the Crusaders,and Canterbury used to sing his name (to the tune of John Philip Sousa&#039;s &quot;Stars and Stripes Forever&quot;, more familiar as a chant used by soccer fans with the chorus sung to the words &quot;Here We Go, Here we go, Here we go&quot;).Sorry, I have gone off on a bit of a tangent here, but I see George Whitelock as a similar sort of player to Thorne; a lot more &quot;rugby-smart&quot; than a lot of people give him credit for.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="smartcooky, post: 399070, member: 20605"] George Whitelock is a hard grafting player who works very hard in the tight. IMO, he cops a similar sort of criticism to that which Reuben Thorne used to get from fans outside the Crusaders area. Thorne would do the hard yards, the often unseen work in the forwards. Some used to criticise him for not being a [I]"ball-carrying 6"[/I] but the truth is that the Crusaders tactics and game plans at that time didn't require him to be one. Thorne regularly topped the tackle count for teams he played for; and the blindside channel at scrum, ruck and maul was effectively closed and bolted whenever Canterbury, the Crusaders or the All Blacks had him wearing the number 6 jersey. The term "Captain Invisible" was coined by some know-nothing idiot sports jocks like Doug Golightly, however, if you ask the PLAYERS who played against the Crusaders or the All Blacks, which player they most hated to play against; most would say it was Thorne. Thorne was the ultimate[I] "Unsung Hero"[/I] so his team-mates at the Crusaders,and Canterbury used to sing his name (to the tune of John Philip Sousa's [I]"Stars and Stripes Forever"[/I], more familiar as a chant used by soccer fans with the chorus sung to the words "[I]Here We Go, Here we go, Here we go").[/I] Sorry, I have gone off on a bit of a tangent here, but I see George Whitelock as a similar sort of player to Thorne; a lot more "rugby-smart" than a lot of people give him credit for. [/QUOTE]

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