Spreading the gospel to China

Some of the 50-odd congregation at the Shanghai Sports Institute had travelled thousands of kilometres to hear those words said with Churchillian conviction.

''You are the pioneers. If and when rugby is established in China it will be due in no small part to your efforts.

''That is why this course is so important. What I teach you, you must teach your students and, when I return to China next year, I want to see more than 40 new teams playing rugby.'' New Zealander George Simpkin had just introduced to China's tertiary level sports teachers the game of rugby.

It was Simpkin's wish that after the Wharf China Rugby Development week in Shanghai last November, these sports scholars would go back to their various provinces to pass on what they had learned to their own students. Effectively, as the theory goes, introducing hundreds of young Chinese people to the sport within a few weeks.

Azat Moruyzjan, 33, who had travelled from the 81 Agricultural University in Xinjiang some 3,000 kilometres away, is one of the pioneers.

A soccer teacher and father of a six-year-old girl first saw the game two years ago on television.

''When I saw rugby on television, I never thought I would one day be coaching the game,'' he said. ''I hope to start rugby in my university when I get back.'' But probably the most important students, as far as Simpkin was concerned, were Wu Tianchen and Yang Hai, sports professors with the one million-strong People's Liberation Army.