THE Scotland lock Doddie Weir, who won his thirty-eighth cap at Carisbrook last weekend, is one of a select band of players at the forefront of the professional revolution in the Northern Hemisphere.
The full-time rugby professional is still a rare beast in the UK but, just at the turn of the year, Weir, 25, bade farewell to Melrose which had been his rugby home since he first turned up at The Greenyards as a 14-year-old and became part of the team which former England stand-off Rob Andrew was building on Tyneside.
Weir, a representative with the Carlsberg-Tetley-Alloa brewery put his career on hold to sign a three-year contract with the English Division II side Newcastle-Gosforth. He was in good company.
Other recruits, bank-rolled by Newcastle United soccer chairman Sir John Hall, included Scotland teammate Gary Armstrong, Irish loose-head prop Nick Popplewell, Welsh second-rower Garath Archer, England wing Tony Underwood plus half a dozen, or so, handy citizens from the English first division.
``Rob is in charge of the rugby, but the club forms part of Sir John Hall's sporting club concept built on the lines of that which has been so successful at the likes of Real Madrid. He has the rugby club, Newcastle United, ice-hockey and basketball outfits.
``It is his intention to make Newcastle the best rugby club in Europe within three years. Next season we will be going hell-for-leather for promotion to the first division. The next season will be one of consolidation and then it will be a case of, the sky's the limit.'' says Weir.
``The benefits of becoming a full-time player more than outweigh the disadvantages. Because of the intense training that you have to put in at international level these days the last thing you feel like doing is going out to train after putting in a full day's work.'' he adds.
This tour is Weir's third visit to the Land of the Long White Cloud. He first was in 1988, as a member of the Scottish Schools' party and his direct opponent at No 8 on that trip was Willie Ofahengaue before visa difficulties intervened and the Tongan tornado was lost to the Wallabies.
Weir returned to New Zealand in 1990 as a member of David Sole's Grand Slam side and won his first cap against Argentina that year.
He has now played the All Blacks on four occasions, the first time being in the third place play-off in Cardiff at the 1991 World Cup; again at Murrayfield in 1993; the third was in the Pretoria quarter-final at last year's World Cup and the fourth encounter was at Carisbrook last weekend.
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