Olympic Games of African countries threatened the IOC with a boycott to force them to ban South Africa and Rhodesia, because of their segregationist regimes. New Zealand was also one of the African boycott targets, because its national rugby union team had toured apartheid-ruled South Africa. The IOC conceded in the first two cases, but refused to ban New Zealand on the grounds that rugby was not an Olympic sport. Fulfilling their threat, twenty African countries were joined by Guyana and Iraq in a withdrawal from the Montreal Games, after a few of their athletes had already competed. Taiwan was excluded from
East Africa rugby union team of Wales national rugby union players. The remaining four matches of the tour were in South Africa, who were celebrating the 75th anniversary of the South African Rugby Board. The first of these was played on May 19 against Boland at Wellington which they won 17–6. The test-match against South Africa, played at King's Park, Durban on May 23, was lost 3–24. The final two games were played on May 27 and May 30 against Northern Transvaal at Pretoria (lost 9–22) and the Orange Free State at Bloemfontein (won 14–6). It was the lack of success experienced by the team