Gaston Lane

Gaston Lane

Birth name	Gaston Lane
Date of birth	(1883-01-31)31 January 1883
Place of birth	Paris, France
Date of death	23 September 1914(1914-09-23) (aged 31)
Place of death	Lironville, France
Height	1.68 m (5 ft 6 in)
Weight	68 kg (150 lb)
Rugby union career
Position(s) Wing, Centre International career Years Team Apps (Points) 1906–1913 France 16 (3)

Gaston Lane (31 January 1883 – 23 September 1914) was a French rugby union player. He was 1 m 68 cm tall and weighed 68 kg.

He played right wing three quarter (later centre) for Racing club de France and for the French national team; at first he also played for AS Bois-Colombes then for the Paris Cosmopolitan Club.

He played in the first French international and was capped ten times, along with Marcel Communeau.

He was a tradesman. He was killed on the front in Moselle at the start of the First World War.

He was an excellent club rugby player, and also occasionally contributed articles to Sporting.

• Racing club de France
• Cosmopolitan Club, Paris
• AS Bois-Colombes (initially)

Gaston Lane was first selected for the French national team for the 1 January 1906 match against the All-Blacks, the first French Test match.

• Second place in French national rugby championship, 1912 with Racing club de France, and captain, alongside Géo André and Pierre Failliot, who also played three quarters.

• 16 caps.
• 1 try (3 points).
• Caps by year: 2 in 1906, 1 in 1907, 2 in 1908, 3 in 1909, 2 in 1910, 2 in 1911, 3 in 1912, 1 in 1913.
• Participated in the first official France match against the All Blacks in their first European tour.
• Captain five times (in 1906, 1910, 1912 & 1913), and captain of the French first XV in the first Five Nations Championship, against Wales at Swansea in 1910 (the second was Marcel Communeau in the next match).
• He was in 4 seasons of the Five Nations Championship in the pre-war period.
• First victory against a Home Nations team, Scotland, in the second French Five Nations Championship, in 1911.

• Godwin, Terry Complete Who's Who of International Rugby (Cassell, 1987, ISBN 0-7137-1838-2)

• Gaston Lane at ESPNscrum