Australia, South Africa and New Zealand alone can boast two Rugby World Cup triumphs. But while the New Zealand and South African brands have forever been strong, Australian rugby has experienced many tough periods when it has struggled for recognition and respect. Australia over the years has suffered 'Woeful Wallabies' tags, and eras when losses were endless and interest in the code nosedived, and the common assumption is that Australian rugby only got its act together in the past few decades - starting with the 1984 Grand Slam victory and culminating in the 1991 and 1999 World Cup triumphs.

John Thornett (second-right) remains one of Australia's most respected captains © Getty Images

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So it is important to remember the Australian game experienced a golden moment 50 years ago, when many observers, overwhelmed by the achievements of the Test team, described Australian rugby as at last "coming of age". It finally had an identity, courtesy of victories on June 19 and June 26, 1965. The inferiority complex that had grown over decades was at last discarded; that happens when the national team wins a Test against the Springboks for the first time on home soil, and then follows up with another conclusive victory to achieve a series triumph - a moment described by New Zealand's most famous and perceptive of rugby writers, T.P McLean, as "the greatest day in Australian Rugby history". In the Australian press, the two Test victories were heralded as the moment when local rugby "heads were at last held high". Or as the Sun-Herald newspaper reported: "No longer are they the poor cousins of the British Isles, New Zealand and South Africa. They are another brother."

The 1965 Australia team remains one of the green and gold's standout line-ups. It seemingly had no weakness. Led by one of Australia's most respected captains, John Thornett, the team boasted the country's greatest scrum-half, Ken Catchpole; masterful five-eighth Phil Hawthorne; two of its most resourceful front-rowers in Peter Johnson and Jon White; admired New Zealand back-row import Greg Davis; and countless dangerous attacking finishers, including Dick Marks, Jim Lenehan and Beres Ellwood. Revered twins Jim and Stewart Boyce were on the wings.

The hint that this group would be something special occurred during the 1963 tour of South Africa, where they succeeded in beating the Springboks in two of the four Tests in Cape Town and Johannesburg. This was no easy feat because the Springboks at the time, like the All Blacks, were regarded as rugby royalty. Australia were often made to feel second-rate, granted only the occasional moment to be allowed to bow in front of them. Two years later, the Australian Test team - no longer intimidated by the Springboks brand - then took advantage of a travelling group destabilised by injuries, late withdrawals, circumstances and several controversies. The 1965 tour squad was certainly nowhere near the mightiest to leave South Africa, but it still featured a fair smattering of gems including Jannie Englebrecht, John Gainsford, Tommy Bedford, Frik du Preez and Abie Malan.

Their seven-match itinerary was somewhat novel as it began with a double-header in Perth, with the Springboks A team beating Western Australia 60-0 before the rest of the touring squad reveled in a 102-0 victory over Western Australia A.

The tour became more animated when they arrived in Melbourne to be confronted by anti-apartheid demonstrators at Essendon Airport. The protesters who had blackened their faces with charcoal, brandished placards that read: "All Blacks are all right", "Ku Klux Klots" and "Please won't you let us play?". The head of the Melbourne University protest group was 20-year-old Gareth Evans, who several decades later became a notable Federal Member of Parliament.

South Africa dismissed Victoria 52-6, after which victory Sydney police arrived en masse at Mascot Airport in anticipation of further trouble. Instead the Springboks were greeted only by several former Wallabies, such as Aub Hodgson and 'Wild Bill' Cerutti, who in the past had tussled with them on a strictly rugby basis and now only wanted to embrace them.

The pressure instead came from the New South Wales selectors, who decided to turn the state match against the Springboks into a Test dress rehearsal by picking a virtual Test team. The ploy worked, as NSW won 12-3 via a Stewart Boyce try. The Australian selectors had seen enough; they named 14 of that team for the Sydney Test, the only outsider being Queensland centre Dick Marks. Then the locals tried the charm offensive. As McLean wrote in his book The Bok Busters, the team was invited to the Northern Suburbs club's dinner party.

"The party was so well done that half of the 'Boks missed the homeward bus, perhaps by intention. The idea was that this would strengthen team unity, forge the bonds of brotherhood and so on and so on. But Sydney girls are the world's most attractive, at least until they begin talking about 'Seedney' and 'stike and meeence', and I am afraid that some of the boys waylaid themselves rather than answer the call of the bugle."

Springboks minds were firmly back on football by the weekend, but Australia, aware that the opposition was surprisingly inexperienced, especially in the tight five, sensed a rare kill … a strange occurrence considering they had never beaten the Boks on their own soil. Certainly the fickle Sydney Cricket Ground football audience thought something was afoot, with the 45,946 attendance figure the highest for an Australian Test match; and the revenue generated by the game of 15,800 pounds was more than three times the previous Australian Rugby Union record. This was a financial boon for the ARU, which for some time had struggled to stay afloat. After all, only 7864 had attended the Australia-England Test just two years earlier at the same ground. At last the ARU had money in reserve.

The team repaid the capacity crowd for its loyalty. Clearly buoyed by the enthusiasm of their audience, Australia won 18-11, dominating up front and scoring out wide through fullback Lenehan and Stewart Boyce. And the margin could have been far more substantial if the Australian kickers - Ellwood and Lenehan - had not missed six penalty shots and two conversions; that said, according to the stunned Springboks, the home team was given an enormous leg-up by Sydney referee Craig Ferguson, who became the the South African's public enemy No.1 after he had basically whistled them off the park. The final penalty count was 17-5 to Australia.

How the Herald Sun reported the famous victory on June 19, 1965 © Courtesy: Greg Growden

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As McLean wrote: "It all should have been glory, especially for Australia. Alas, it was mostly bitterness, gall and wormwood. Mr Craig Ferguson turned out to be the central and, to the South Africans, the sinister figure of the match … He exacerbated the South Africans until some of them were in a frenzied state of rage."

Maybe that's why their second-rower Piet Botha lost control and started kicking away at Hawthorne during a ruck just before half-time. As Peter Johnson wrote in his autobiography A Rugby Memoir, Hawthorne "lay there with a long gash to his head, which was bleeding like the Ganges". Hawthorne rushed to the sideline to get several stitches inserted, and returned in the second half his head swathed in bandages. Somehow Botha stayed on the field. Then again kicking was all the rage in this Test. The Sun-Herald reported the ball was booted into touch 62 times.

It was clear after the game whom the Springboks wanted to boot. Their manager, Jacobus Louw, tried to be chivalrous by uttering that "it was a very fine win for Australia". Then came the big 'but'. "But unfortunately I must agree with so many Aussies who have told me they are embarrassed tonight to have won this way. It could have been a very good game and they all could have been satisfied. But everybody tells me they were not happy with the number of the referee's decisions, and that is not serving the best interests of rugby."

The Springboks were clearly rattled by Ferguson. The referee repeatedly threatened that he would send off players, including Tony Naude. "If you order me from the field for this," Naude told Ferguson, "I shall refuse to go."

Johnson, the Wallabies hooker, countered: "The penalties I witnessed seemed to me to be fair, especially those in the lineout. For 60 years the Springboks had been masters of scrums and lineouts in world rugby by cleverly bending the rules. At the Cricket Ground that day, the Boks' lineout obstruction was palpable, and their lifting, something ignored in South Africa, quite incredible. Added to this was a degree of tension within the Boks' own ranks, judging from the way captain Nelie Smith was overwhelmed by a ranting Abie Malan when Nelie politely questioned a ruling from Ferguson. It was clear Malan saw himself as being in command. Even at school I knew taking on the referee was suicide."

The sports editor of the Sydney Sun newspaper wrote that Whistle While You Work must have been Ferguson's theme song. He calculated that Ferguson had blown the whistle 140 times, counting penalties, stoppages for lineouts (62), scrums (24), injuries and ordering the ball to be put into scrums a second or third time.

The South African management was at least relieved that another Australian referee Kevin Crowe would be in charge of the second Test at Lang Park in Brisbane a week later. Their contentment was short lived. On arrival in the Queensland capital, the Boks discovered they had been allocated substandard accommodation. They had been booked into The Globe Hotel, with just seven rooms set aside for the players. The team, clearly worried about having two or three in the one bed, walked out, and demanded that they move down the road to Lennons, Brisbane's largest hotel and one of Australia's most expensive. After several crisis meetings, the penny-pinching ARU, who had to foot the bill, nervously agreed, as long as the Springboks did not have their meals in the dining room but ate at the considerably cheaper snack bar.

Yet another Australian victory was required to help alleviate the ARU's financial stress. Again the local referee focused heavily on the Springboks, penalising them repeatedly, enabling Australia to score the required points via shots at goal to win 12-8. But the 16 penalties against the tourists were apparently justified, with McLean writing: "The Springboks robbed themselves." South African rugby guru Danie Craven accepted: "A lack of knowledge of the rules was one of the main reasons or South Africa's present downfall in rugby." As crucial was an exceptional defensive effort by the Australians that restricted the Springboks to two tries, enabling Peter Crittle, Jules Guerassimoff and co to chair their captain Thornett from the field.

Australia team manager Bill McLaughlin, who had during that period experienced endless demoralising moments when his Test men were simply not up to the task, was overwhelmed by the moment. "It is the greatest Test I have ever seen in my career, not because we won but because of the hardness and spirit of the match," McLaughlin said.

This series triumph remains an epic achievement for a country that had at the time extremely limited resources. After all, when the Springboks back-up players trained that morning, three of the balls they were using had to be grabbed off them because they were required for the Test curtain-raiser.

Even grim times can produce gold.