January 3 down the years
Brownlie becomes an unwanted note in history
Scrum.com

1925
A landmark day in rugby history when Cyril Brownlie became the first player to be sent off in an international when Welsh referee Albert Freethy issued the marching orders at Twickenham. New Zealand won 17-11 with 14 men. Within minutes of the start Freethy gave warnings to both sides to little effect. Then in the seventh minute, in his own words: "In some loose play the ball had been sent away and two or three England forwards were lying on the ground. Brownlie was a few feet away from them, and as he came back he deliberately kicked on the leg an England forward lying face downward on the ground. I had taken my eye off the ball for a moment, and therefore saw exactly what happened. Previous to this I had warned each side generally three times, and therefore I had no option but to send Brownlie off the field. I much regretted having to do this, but in the circumstances I had no alternative but to take this drastic action." Brownlie played the third and final Test of his career a fortnight later in France.

1885
ArthurGould, Wales's first rugby great, made his cap debut playing out of position at fullback for a Welsh side that was beaten by England at Swansea. An allround athlete and stalwart of Newport for 16 years, Gould played 27 Tests for Wales from 1885, until 1897 when he was forced into retirement following a dispute over the funds raised for his testimonial.

1948
The Wallabies gave their best Test performance of their tour beating England 11-0 at Twickenham through two tries by Col Windon and one by Alan Walker. The visitors thus won three of their four Tests in the Home Unions and did not concede a single try in the four internationals played.

1970
HO de Villiers was the stand-out player for the Springboks in their 24-11 win against the North-Eastern Counties at the County Ground, Gosforth. The fullback scored a try, landed three conversions and kicked a penalty goal to provide the tourists with half of their points.

1988
Rugby announced the launch of a pools service based on newly formed leagues. RFU secretary Dudley Wood is a supporter, saying; "We have had two or three proposals to run pools for the first time and we are looking into them. We think if is a good idea that would produce revenue. We hold the rights to our fixtures and nobody could do it without our agreement." The pools never got off the ground.

1976
England ran up their then highest score against Australia with a powerful pack display backed by some enterprising backs play. England won 23-6 with tries from David Duckham and new caps Barrie Corless and Mike Lampkowski. Fullback Alastair Hignell weighed in with three penalties and a conversion as Australia slid to their third straight loss.

1985
Veteran Northampton lock Vince Cannon never played for England and perhaps his outburst on the eve of the Romania match explains why. Picked on the bench, he let rip: "I would love to see England stuffed by Romania and then stuffed every game until the selection committee are sacked. The whole system is a mockery." His gripe was that four locks had been picked in the squad but when Jim Syddall dropped out an replacement was drafted in rather than one of the others being picked.

1907
The Springboks beat a French Selection XV 55-6 in Paris in the last match of their European tour. Dietlof Maré scored 22 points.

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