The 1985 Kangaroo Tour of New Zealand was a mid-season tour of New Zealand by the Australia national rugby league team. The Australians played six matches on tour, including the final two games of a three-game test series against the New Zealand with the first test taking place in Brisbane on 18 June. The NZ tour began on 19 June and finished on 10 July.
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Leadership
After long time coach Frank Stanton stepped down from representative coaching duties after Australia's successful defense of The Ashes in 1984 against the touring Great Britain Lions, the Australian Rugby League appointed former World Cup and Parramatta Eels coach Terry Fearnley as head coach of the Kangaroos. The team was captained by Wally Lewis who had also captained the team in 1984.
Controversy
While he was named Australian coach, Terry Fearnley had also been appointed as New South Wales State of Origin coach in 1985. The Blues won their first ever Origin series in 1985 after winning games 1 and two. In what was to prove a case of bad planning, the test series and the tour of New Zealand were scheduled to take place between games 2 and 3 of the Origin series.
Fearnley and Lewis allegedly did not get along on tour, with Lewis later confirming this by admitting in television interviews that the pair hated each other. Lewis also publicly stated that he believed Fearnley openly favoured the teams vice-captain, NSW's Wayne Pearce as well as the rest of the Kangaroos who were in his NSW team. At one point before the third test in Auckland, Lewis claimed to have caught Fearnley and Pearce going over team selection in Fearnely's hotel room, something strongly denied by the pair.
Fearnley himself created controversy on the tour. In the book King Wally which was published in 1987, Wally Lewis claimed that Fearnley had said of team member Michael O'Connor (a NSW player) "Can't play, no heart. Lucky he can kick goals or he wouldn't be here". The publishing of this story led to some animosity over the coming years between Lewis and O'Connor. But the biggest controversy came from the team selection for the third test. Fearnley dropped four players from the second test win, all Queenslanders, which caused all hell to break loose and prompted Queensland Rugby League Chairman, Senator Ron McAuliffe, to publicly condemned the dropping of the four Queensland players from a winning Test side, saying "Its a football assassination and beyond all reasoning. And there can be no reasonable excuse for it". The Kangaroos would go on to lose the third test 18-0, the first time they had been held scoreless since losing 19-0 to Great Britain in 1956.
Terry Fearnley stepped down as Australian coach following the tour. He would be replaced in 1986 by Don Furner.
As a result of the problems during the tour, the Australian Rugby League made a number of decisions for future Australian teams, including:
First Test
Immediately prior to the tour, the first test took place at Lang Park in Brisbane on 18 June. This match is most remembered for the sideline fight between rival prop forwards Greg Dowling and Kevin Tamati after the pair had been sent to the sin-bin for fighting.
Tour
The Australian's played six games on the tour, winning five.
2nd Test
The Australian's escaped with a 10-6 win over New Zealand thanks to a last minute try to winger John Ribot.
3rd Test
The dead rubber third test also doubled as the first game of the 1985–1988 Rugby League World Cup tournament.