Ailing All Blacks wing Jonah Lomu made an unspectacular return to representative rugby on Saturday, playing the first half in Wellington's 27-17 loss to Taranaki in a preseason match.
Lomu, who is undergoing dialysis three times a week while awaiting a kidney transplant, wore his famous No. 11 jersey for the match at Porirua Park. He played 40 minutes, touched the ball three times but did not run with it, and made one tackle.
The 28-year-old Lomu didn't show any glimpses of the form that made him one of the most feared players in rugby. His most taxing time may have been at the end of the match when he signed autographs for dozens of children that were part of the estimated crowd of 3,000.
The match was his first since March and his first since his kidneys shut down in June as a result of the rare nephrotic syndrome.
When Lomu suffered a dramatic decline in health two months ago, general medical opinion was that he would never play rugby again. There is no recorded instance of a player receiving dialysis playing rugby at a representative level.
But Lomu, in messages posted on his popular Web site, has insisted he will defeat his illness and recover his All Blacks jersey for the World Cup in October and November in Australia.
In the mid 1990s, Lomu became one of the most admired players in international rugby, progressing beyond his first, halting steps as New Zealand's youngest test player.
He grew from a green and hesitant youngster in 1994 into a player able to use his size and speed -- he weighs 119kg -- to wreck opposing backlines.
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