Here’s a pub quiz sports stumper: Who was New Zealand’s first English top flight footballer?
Ryan Nelsen? Winston Reid? Chris Wood?
How about Colin Walker for Sheffield Wednesday in the first division in 1986, or Lee Norfolk at Ipswich Town in 1995 in the early years of the English Premier League.
No. Try Reg Boyne, an Aucklander who debuted for a glamour club in England’s top flight more than 100 years before Wood began banging in goals for Burnley.
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Yet, Boyne’s groundbreaking move to England’s top tier is not widely known, even among ardent New Zealand football fans.
Football writers at Stuff had not heard of Boyne before a casual search this month of Papers Past archives disclosed he was a trainer for the first New Zealand international team in 1922.
Boyne’s Aston Villa association remained all-but forgotten for over a century. Imagine the fanfare today. His signing for FA Cup holders Aston Villa from Auckland’s club competition would be like a Kiwi joining Manchester City or Liverpool today.
Within weeks of his arrival in England, the 22-year-old inside forward went from scoring in front of a few hundred people at Wellington’s Newtown Park to playing alongside big-name England internationals in front of 35,000 at Villa Park.
How did a young Auckland joiner get there? By dint of his skill, but also through a decent dollop of luck.
Boyne was born in Leeds but immigrated with his family as an 11-year-old. He reportedly learned his football at Beresford St School in Freeman’s Bay and represented Auckland in the Brown Shield interprovincial series in 1910 as an 18-year-old.
Boyne had also been a talented goalkeeper. The Auckland Star suggested his “brilliance’’ between the posts for YMCA against Caledonian in 1909 should “bring him under the [Auckland] selector’s eye’’. He played in goal for 45 minutes of that match then spent the second half at striker, where he made his name.
His career took off in 1910 after joining Auckland’s Everton FC (named after the famous English football club) where he sometimes played alongside younger brothers Harold and Edgar.
Everton’s arch-rivals, Brotherhood, brought a goalkeeper, H J Burton, to Auckland from the Aston Manor club in Birmingham for the 1913 season, according to a newspaper report.
Burton and Boyne were direct adversaries, but the English keeper was evidently impressed with Auckland’s sharpshooter.
The shortlived Sportsman newspaper published a story on Boyne, details of which were recently highlighted on an Auckland library blog site.
Jack Baker’s article revealed that Boyne “scored three great running goals in the first half’’ of a victory over Brotherhood at Auckland Domain. Burton, the “son of an Aston Villa director’’, approached Boyne at halftime. Within earshot of Jack Baker, he said: “Reg, would you go home to play for Aston Villa if you had a chance?’’
Boyne’s grandson, Gavin, told Stuff on Monday that his grandfather replied: “Would I ever?’’
Boyne, who had scored 19 goals in 12 matches at one stage of his career-turning season, stayed on to lead Everton FC to the Founders Cup title.
He caught the southbound express to play for Auckland against Wellington in a Brown Shield representative game at Newtown Park, rated by The Dominion as “the prettiest game of soccer seen in Wellington for many years’’.
The two teams were guests at a post-match dinner at The New Zealander hotel where it was revealed Boyne had been “offered and had accepted an engagement to play for Aston Villa, one of the leading clubs in England.’’
Accompanied by Burton, Boyne left on October 20, 1913 aboard the Maheno for Sydney to catch a P and O steamer for London.
The voyage to England would have taken over a month. Boyne arrived in London and “signed the contract with three Aston Villa directors’’, according to an article on England’s Everton FC Heritage Society website. “To his great surprise, billboards and placards in Birmingham heralded his arrival.’’
Boyne, a joiner in Auckland, reportedly signed for Villa for £4 a week – a far cry from today’s Premier League pay rates. (The Salary Sport website estimates Aston Villa’s weekly wage bill is almost £1.2 million, with star Brazilian midfielder Philippe Coutinho earning a cool £150,000 a week, or £7.8 million a year).
Burton had billed Boyne as “absolutely the outstanding figure of New Zealand football’’, according to the Villa News and Record. He was “a born footballer’’, six foot and 13 stone, with “a magnificent shot with wonderful control of the ball’’.
Aston Villa were used to casting their talent net far and wide. They had offered a trial to Bob Craig, a dual Australian rugby union and league international after the Kangaroos’ tour of Britain in 1911-12. But the Villa News and Record claimed Craig “did not come up to Villa standard’’ in the soccer game. It expected more of Boyne, “another colonial aspirant to fame’’ because of his football background.
Within weeks of his arrival, Boyne was making his English first division debut, against Bradford City at Villa Park on December 27. It was the Villians’ third Christmas season game in consecutive days, beginning with a 2-0 victory at Derby County’s Baseball Ground on Christmas Day, and followed by a 3-0 home trouncing of Sheffield United.
Boyne, the new recruit from the colonies, found himself replacing England international inside forward Joe Bache, a club legend. His teammates included legendary England goalkeeper Sam Hardy, England centre forward ‘Happy’ Harry Hampton and future England cap Clem Stephenson.
Hardy, an ex- Liverpool keeper, Hampton and Bache had been stars of Villa’s sixth title-winning team in 1910. They were also part of the 1913 FA Cup winning team where Villa – league runners-up – beat champions Sunderland 1-0 through Tommy Barber’s goal, to deny the north-east club the league and cup double in front of 121,919 fans at London’s Crystal Palace stadium. Such was the company, Reginald Boyne, late of Auckland, was keeping.
Seven cup final heroes were alongside Boyne when he made his bow in the big-time. Five Villa players were playing their third game in as many days. Perhaps the exertions took a toll as Bradford upset the home side, 1-0.
The Daily Citizen noted: “Aston Villa’s New Zealander made his initial appearance and, for some reason or other, the crowd were disappointed – they probably expected him to have two or three feathers in his hair.’’
Boyne retained his place for the next game, partnering England internationals Hampton, Bache, Stephenson and Charlie Wallace in, arguably, the greatest forward line he ever played in.
But it wasn’t a happy start to the New Year, with Sheffield United thumping Villa 3-0 at Bramall Lane on January 1, just five days after losing by the same score in Birmingham.
Boyne was retained in the same forward line for the 0-0 home draw against 2014 league champions Blackburn Rovers at Ewood Park – where All Whites centreback Ryan Nelsen would play from 2005 to 2012, almost a century later.
The Villa News and Record noted: “Boyne did several smart things and was not notably played to as generously by his comrades as we should have liked to see.”
After three games in six days, it was back to the ‘stiffs’ – the reserve team – for Boyne.
There were no substitutes in English football then – even for mid-match injuries. It was hard for a new boy to break back in with Hampton and Bache both in rich scoring form as Villa surged up the table. Boyne missed the 6-0 drubbing of Manchester United at Old Trafford, where Bache grabbed a hat-trick.
The Kiwi recruit made just one more first-team appearance in his breakthrough season, in a 1-0 home win over Burnley before 30,000 fans, on March 21. He watched from the sidelines again as Villa completed the season, finishing second, seven points behind Blackburn.
But Boyne had done enough to earn a second season at Villa. When the official team photograph was taken, by former Villa star Albert Wilkes, in the spring of 1914, the Kiwi was standing proudly in the back row.
Opportunities were again scarce in 1914-15. Boyne had to wait until October for his season debut, in a 3-0 away loss at Bradford City and was in the shadows for another three months before returning for a 0-0 January draw with Sheffield Wednesday.
He kept his place for the 1-0 FA Cup defeat to Manchester City and another scoreless draw with Bradford.
That would prove Boyne’s last Aston Villa appearance. Eight games – three against Bradford City – across two seasons.
Britain declared war on Germany a day before the start of the 1914 season. Play continued, but crowd numbers dwindled. Football authorities decided to cancel the 1915-16 season as players departed in droves for the war theatres of Europe.
Boyne had five more games for Aston Villa in wartime friendlies and turned out as a guest player for Notts County.
Working as an aircraft fitter in Leicestershire, he made 23 appearances for Leicester Fosse (the forerunner of current Premier League club Leicester City). Boyne scored two goals for Fosse, who according to Leicester City’s official historian, had six players killed in action by July 1916.
Grandson Gavin said Boyne also turned out for Millwall during his English stay.
While living in Loughborough, Boyne would have learned of his brother Harold’s death in the Battle of Messines on February 21, 1917. “That really rocked him, apparently,’’ Gavin Boyne said. “The two brothers were really close.’’
But there were happier times, too. At 27, he married Yvonne Viaene, who had fled war-torn Belgium and met Boyne at the Loughborough factory.
The Boynes were wed in December 1918 – a month after the war’s end and were soon on the move. Reg was released by Aston Villa after no goals in eight official appearances to join Brentford FC in the Southern League First Division on a salary of 2 pounds per week.
He was an immediate hit, scoring six goals in the first six games, but was then struck down by a knee injury. Without Boyne’s scoring knack, Brentford tumbled down the table, but he returned to finish as the club’s top scorer with 13 goals in 27 appearances, including a hat-trick in a 5-0 rout of Northampton Town.
Despite finishing 15th, Brentford were elected to the Football League, joining the Third Division South for the 1920-21 season – 50 years before future All Whites midfielder and assistant coach Brian Turner played for the west London club.
Boyne’s contract was upgraded to 5 pounds 15 shillings per week and he provided an instant return.The Kiwi remains forever etched in Brentford’s annals by scoring the club’s first Football League goal at their old home ground, Griffin Park, netting in a 1-0 victory over Millwall.
Injuries again limited him to 21 games, but Boyne – who bagged doubles against Reading and Gillingham – still finished as second top scorer to ex-Arsenal wartime forward Harry King, with 10 goals.
Boyne – still only 29 – retired from Brentford at the end of the season and, in September 1921, he and wife Yvonne left Southampton on the steamer Remuera, bound for Auckland.
He arrived home unheralded, and must still have been troubled by his injury in 1922 because he was not selected for New Zealand’s first international series against Australia in June.
A NZ Truth report noted Boyne “looked after the New Zealand team as a trainer’’ for the 3-1 third test win in Auckland on July 8, stating he “had the misfortune to break his leg’’ at Brentford, “so he returned home where he may play again’’.
Boyne dashed onto Carlaw Park to treat an injury to New Zealand midfielder Neil McArthur, upsetting ambulance officers who insisted they should be the first responders.
It proved the only time Boyne took the field in a New Zealand international – he never won a New Zealand cap.
Boyne became a father to Gladys Yvonne in 1922. Son Harold Louis followed in 1926, but work and parental commitments aside, he retained an interest in football.
He served on the Soccer Old Boys’ Association of Auckland committee in 1929 and, aged 46, was a headline attraction, along with Ted Carter (a former Wolverhampton Wanderers midfielder who had settled in New Zealand) on an Auckland Old Boys team for an exhibition game against a New Zealand Old Boys side at Blandford Park in September 1938.
Boyne was also the Auckland senior team’s sole selector in 1948.
His son, Harold played for the Eden club and represented Auckland.
Reg Boyne settled in Mount Eden where, in later life, he was a keen lawn bowler at the Epsom club.
He was a project manager on the Grafton Bridge reconstruction in Auckland and was clerk of works for a Westfield Freezing Works building project before ending his working life as an Auckland City Council building inspector.
Aged 71, Boyne died in Auckland in 1963, a year before a New Zealand team embarked on a 15-match world tour, which would have been unthinkable in his day.
Reg Boyne may only have played eight times for Villa – four more than current All Whites coach Danny Hay for Leeds United – but he was a true trailblazer.
The joiner from Grey Lynn, in his own way, paved the way for the likes of Ryan Nelsen, Winston Reid and Chris Wood, to world football’s top flight.
Stuff acknowledges various research resources, including Stuff newspaper archives, Papers Past, Auckland Library, Everton FC Heritage Society, the Aston Villa FC History.co.uk website, New Zealand football historian Barry Smith, and Reg Boyne’s grandson, Gavin Boyne.
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