Cyril Towers - Representative Career

Representative Career

His representative debut was as a 19 year old in 1926 when selected for the New South Wales Waratahs to appear against a touring All Blacks outfit. New South Wales won the match 26-20 and Towers was recalled for the fourth encounter which the hosts lost 21-28. With no Queensland Rugby Union administration or competition in place from 1919 to 1929, the New South Wales Waratahs were the top Australian representative rugby union side of the period and these debut matches were in 1986 decreed by the Australian Rugby Union as official Test matches.

Towers was selected for the 1927-28 Waratahs tour of Britain, France and Canada, turning 21 on the ship going over. He played in 25 matches of the tour exceeded only by Wylie Breckenbridge (29), Tom Lawton (27) and Alex Ross (29). With Jack Ford he was the equal top try scorer and the equal second highest point scorer behind Lawton. He played in three Test matches of the tour.

He wrote a travel diary of the 1927-28 tour which was serialised between June and December 1928 for the magazine Australian Banker. (Towers worked in banking). His Test match reports are quoted extensively in the tour article.

Towers toured New Zealand in 1928 with the Waratahs under Syd Malcolm as captain. Geoff Bland was the only other veteran from the 1927 World Tour squad and five matches in total were won and five lost. Towers played in all matches, including three Tests and was top scorer with 29 points. Howell quotes Chester and McMillan from The Visitors: "Towers was hailed by many critics as the best centre in the world rugby and was certainly one of the great Australian players of all time".

In 1929 the All Blacks toured Australia, Towers was in two of the three Test sides captained by Tom Lawton which for the first time in history beat the All Blacks 3-0 in a series whitewash. With the Queensland Rugby Union now back in existence for the first time since 1919 this was the first truly national Wallabies side fielded since 1914.