Pages tagged with: maori sport

The Natives prepare to play in Queensland in July 1889 on the homeward leg of the tour. Bill Brien Collection The story of the Aboriginal cricket tour of 1868 - a decade before the first white Australian team went to Britain  -  has been told by John Mulvaney in Cricket Walkabout (Melbourne, 1967).

The title of 'The Originals' was bestowed on the next New Zealand rugby team to tour Britain, that of 1905-6, but even though it was soon forgotten, the Natives' tour was to have enduring significance for New Zealand rugby and society.

The rugby played by the Natives was different from the game we know today.

South Africa's apartheid policies and attitudes created obvious problems for New Zealand rugby, given the prominence of Māori in the sport.

In 1872, 'Wirihana' became the first recorded Maori rugby player when he turned out for Wanganui

In the absence of any body regulating the game in New Zealand, Eyton was free to promote a tour of Britain as a private venture

After playing nine matches in New Zealand and two in Melbourne in the southern winter of 1888 (with only two losses), the Natives set off for Britain by steamer.

Between their first and last matches in Britain, the Natives played on average every 2.3 days.

Although hacking and tripping had been banned in the 1870s to make the game safe enough to appeal to gentlemen, rugby remained dangerous.

In 1888 the gentlemen who ran the Rugby Union (and the Empire) were based in southern England, and the England test was played in London. Yet the playing strength of the English game was in the north.

What effect did the Natives' tour have on rugby and wider New Zealand society? It showed that New Zealanders could compete on equal terms with representatives of the imperial centre at rugby in a way they were embarrassingly unable to do at cricket

‘Bad enough having play team officially designated New Zealand Natives’, a South African journalist wrote in a report of the match played between the Springboks and a New Zealand Maori XV at Napier.

George Nēpia is considered to be one of New Zealand rugby’s finest players. He played all 32 matches for the famous 1924-25 ‘Invincibles’ on their tour of the British Isles, France and Canada

Souvenir programme for the rugby match between South Africa and NZ Māori on 28 August 1965

Souvenir programme for the rugby match between the British Isles (Lions) and NZ Māori on 5 September 1959

Souvenir programme for the rugby match between France and NZ Māori at McLean Park, Napier on 29 July 1961

New Zealand Herald video about the New Zealand Māori rugby team in their centenary year