\u201cBut surviving was only the beginning.<\/p>\n
Shane Varley, who played 11 tests for the Kiwis, has been left unable to walk after serious health problems. Photo \/ Photosport<\/p>\n
\u201cShane woke up to a completely different life. He can no longer walk.\u201d<\/p>\n
The 71-year-old former league player was described as an active and independent person and losing the ability to walk has been \u201csoul-destroying\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe needs support with daily care, mobility and safety, along with ongoing rehabilitation to give him the best possible chance of regaining independence.<\/p>\n
\u201cOver the next two years, he will need rehabilitation, specialist appointments, psychological support, mobility equipment, transport and additional care that may not be funded.\u201d<\/p>\n
So far, Varley has received $3475 in donations, including from the Leigh Past Players group, one of the teams he played for in England.<\/p>\n
He played 23 times for the English club in 1983, scoring 12 points from three tries. <\/p>\n
In New Zealand, the 71-year-old was a key member of Richmond\u2019s back-to-back Fox Memorial grand final wins in 1979 and 1980 and was named as a member of the club\u2019s team of the century in 2013.<\/p>\n
Richmond have encouraged people to donate to his cause and praised his contributions to the club. <\/p>\n
\u201cMany people know Old Boy Shane Varley as a teammate, clubman, and friend,\u201d he club said in a statement. <\/p>\n
\u201cHe is someone who has dedicated years to the rugby league community, always willing to lend a hand, share his knowledge, support others, and proudly wear the Richmond colors [sic].\u201d <\/p>\n
The former halfback debuted for Auckland in 1975 and earned his first call-up to the Kiwis for the 1978 tour of Australia and Papua New Guinea. <\/p>\n
Varley would also feature in New Zealand\u2019s 1980 tour of Britain and France, where he featured in seven minor matches, and the 1982 tour of Australia.<\/p>\n
His final run with the Kiwis came in 1984 after he started all three tests at home against Great Britain in the No 7 jersey, with New Zealand pulling off a 3-0 whitewash against the touring side.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cBut surviving was only the beginning. Shane Varley, who played 11 tests for the Kiwis, has been left…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":581392,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[74,6030,31746,68619,6636,9881,2740,26882,42,134,807,14731,11285,3223,661,65795,43,6327,7228,53883,61,40,38,41,39,1847,1237,286364,34890,80],"class_list":["post-581391","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-after","tag-again","tag-arrests","tag-cardiac","tag-challenge","tag-facing","tag-former","tag-halfback","tag-headlines","tag-health","tag-kiwis","tag-league","tag-learning","tag-legend","tag-major","tag-nearfatal","tag-news","tag-rugby","tag-shane","tag-surviving","tag-to","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-twin","tag-two","tag-varley","tag-walk","tag-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581391","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=581391"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581391\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/581392"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=581391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=581391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=581391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}