Dick Tooth

Richard Murray Tooth (21 September 1929 – 5 August 2020 ) was an Australian rugby union footballer of the 1950s. He represented the Wallabies in ten Test matches and nineteen total appearances and was Australian captain on two occasions. He resided at St Andrew's College while studying at Sydney University. His club rugby was played with the Sydney University Football Club and later with Randwick in the Shute Shield. He practised as an orthopaedic surgeon and was a sports medicine pioneer.

Early life and education Tooth was born in Bombala and his family relocated to Newcastle when he was seven years of age. He attended Newcastle Boys' High School and represented the school in rugby league, swimming (member of the 1943 Farlow Cup winning team) and athletics (member of the 1943 winning teams, CHS Juvenile Shield, Kerr and Lintott Cups). An all-round schoolboy athlete, he swam in the summer with the Cooks Hill Surf Life Saving Club.

While studying science at the University of Sydney and domiciled at St Andrew's College, Tooth played inter-collegiate rugby and grade rugby for the University. In 1949 he switched to medicine and at the same time cemented a spot in Sydney's University's 2nd grade side. From there he was selected in an Australian Universities XV who met a New Zealand Universities side for a three match series in 1949.

He focussed on his studies for the next couple of years but in 1954 was back in the national side in a series of games against the visiting Fijians playing in one Test at fullback and another at centre. In 1955 he was selected in the Wallaby touring party to New Zealand captained by his University colleague John Solomon. He appeared in twelve of the thirteen tour games at either fullback or fly-half and had a sound tour. Their daughter, Liane Tooth, is a double Olympic gold medallist.

His nephew Tim Walsh was a first grade rugby player with Leeds Carnegie and made a number of representative appearances for Australia at Rugby Sevens.