Frank Waring played for UCT and was always a menace to us, UCT's traditional rivals at Stellenbosch. It was because he was so closely marked that Frankie developed a short punt second to none. I have never seen any centre do it better and he invariably caught it himself or it was there for the taking by one of his team-mates.

He developed then what I call a "footpass" - a ball which is actually kicked with the purpose of regaining possession, either by the kicker himself or one of his team-mates.

Waring was a certainty to be selected for the 1937 tour but he withdrew from the team: how we missed him on that tour.

We were battling against a 3-0 lead during the test against Ireland in 1931 when we broke through. Frank was clear with only the fullback to beat and he had that great wing, Zimerman, on his outside. It was our rule in those days that you had to draw the opponent and pass to your team-mate.

However, Frank elected to sell the dummy and to break inside. He was tackled by a cover defender and how he extricated himself from that tackle I will never know - it must have taken a superhuman effort! - but he did and scored. We converted and just managed to beat Ireland. When we got back to the dressing room, Frank was up-ended and thoroughly "borseled" because he should have passed.

To return to some of the games we played in South Africa: They once played me at centre against the 1933 Wallabies and I had Frank as a partner; and thank heavens for that. He told me so many things about centre play which I had not been aware of. For instance, he guided me to tackle the opposing centres quickly before they could get going. The Wallabies had those two brilliant centres, Sturtridge and Cowper and had we allowed them to get into stride, we would have been in trouble. I listened to his advice and we tackled them out of the game.

Later, Frank became Minister of Sport. I will always respect him for his utter devotion to rugby.