The introduction of (some) European sports to Aotearoa New Zealand: Part 2

Aotearoa New Zealand is a sporting nation. Hundreds of thousands of people around the country take to the sports field, court, pool, velodrome, and many other arenas every week to participate in their chosen sport. Many sports have European origins (click here for ngā taonga tākaro | traditional Māori games), arrived through European migration and have remained a part of the cultural landscape of Aotearoa New Zealand ever since. Explore the chronological origins of some of our popular sports. Tennis, football, and netball feature here in part two and click here for the origins of cricket, cycling, and rugby union.

Tennis

With the popularity of rugby union in Aotearoa New Zealand today, it is hard to believe that tennis was introduced in the 1870s alongside it. In fact, Tennis New Zealand is one of the oldest tennis associations in the world and was founded in 1886 – the same year the first New Zealand Tennis Championships were played in Hawkes Bay.

A notable early tennis player was Sir Māui Pōmare. Though better known for his medical and political careers, having held the position of Minister of Health from 1923-1926, Pōmare won the USA Inter-Varsity Tennis Championships in 1899 while studying abroad. In the early 1910s the world-ranked number one player was a Kiwi. Tony Wilding was the Wimbledon champion from 1910-1913. He unfortunately did not have further opportunity to defend his title as he was killed in action in the First World War in the Battle of Aubers Ridge, France.

Football

In 1891 the New Zealand Football Association (NZFA) was formed. Within thirty years there were more than 450 football clubs across the country. Football remains the most popular sport for much of the world, however since the heights of 450 clubs in the 1920s has fallen in popularity here in Aotearoa.

The first Chatham Cup was contested in 1923. Though women began playing organised football following the First World War, the women’s equivalent of the Chatham Cup, the Kate Sheppard Cup, was not contested until 1994. In 2023, the FIFA Women’s World Cup was co-hosted by Aotearoa New Zealand and Australia and the Football Ferns won their first ever World Cup match in the opening game.

The age demographic most likely to be injured playing football is 10–19-year-olds, making up almost 17,000 injuries per year. Football injuries have remained steady at approximately 45,000 per year for the last decade. To help reduce injury though preventative measures, New Zealand Football has produced a comprehensive guide to injury prevention and management for players.

Netball

The most popular sport for Kiwi women, “women’s basketball” was introduced in 1906-1907. Despite representative games played as early as 1923 and international games played from 1938, standardised rules for the game were not formalised until 1957 by the International Federation of Netball Associations. Prior to this date, like ngā taonga tākaro, teams and clubs would meet beforehand and come to a consensus on the rules they would play under.

In 1963 the first Netball World Championships were held and though New Zealand made it to the finals, the team lost to Australia. Our success, and the popularity of the sport, saw televised netball coverage included as one of the ‘big four’ sports from the 1980s. The other three sports were rugby union, rugby league, and cricket. The first Commonwealth Games to feature netball was in 1998 and the appropriately named Silver Ferns came home with a silver medal. Today, the country’s domestic ANZ Premiership league features 47 games played over 14 weeks by six teams.

Recently, ACC SportSmart and Netball New Zealand have produced a booklet for young players. The booklet encourages preventative practices including warming up and cooling down, as well as focusing on the importance of mental health and the changes young people’s bodies experience that could impact their health and safety playing the sport. The booklet and Netball New Zealand’s Junior Policy have been created in part due to ACC statistics illustrating a 60% surge in injuries since 2008. With many young girls choosing to play netball from primary school, the focus from Netball New Zealand on raising healthy and safe players could mean a future reduction in netball-related injuries.