After 50 years covering nearly every sport in North Otago, the Otago Daily Times correspondent retired recently from his duties in broadcasting and print.
His contributions were recognised by the North Otago Rugby Football Union in a ceremony after the Heartland Championship game at his beloved Centennial Park in Oamaru on Saturday.
O’Neill said his work was not ‘‘out of the ordinary’’ but he loved his time covering rugby, cricket, netball and everything in between.
‘‘It’s become a bit of a habit, because if you keep doing it, nobody else steps in ... but it was a love,’’ O’Neill said.
In 1971, O’Neill started writing for both the Oamaru Mail and the Otago Daily Times, and he has been involved in broadcasting since 1977, with Radio New Zealand, Radio Waitaki, Port FM and more recently with Real 104 Radio.
He has broadcast more than 370 games of secondary school rugby — including the annual interschool between Waitaki Boys’ High School and St Kevin’s College since 1981 — and Old Golds games.
In the mid-1990s, O’Neill also supplied commentaries at Carisbrook with the introduction of Super Rugby.
In 2013, he was honoured with the national Garry Frew Memorial Award, recognising outstanding contribution to provincial sports journalism, and he received a Queen’s Service Medal for services to sports journalism in the 2020 New Year Honours.
O’Neill, a former teacher at St Kevin’s, was also a handy five-eighth, playing for North Otago from 1957 to 1963. He was made a life member of North Otago rugby in 2012.
North Otago rugby chief executive Colin Jackson told O’Neill what he had done for the union was ‘‘absolutely brilliant’’.
‘‘We will never replace you — you’re a one-off,’’ Jackson said.
‘‘You’re a doyen of North Otago rugby, plus all the other sports.’’
O’Neill will not be far from a sporting field, though, as he plans to still be on the sideline watching rugby and cricket matches each week.
