Māori All Blacks

Beginning

The New Zealand Natives' football team prior to playing Queensland in July 1889

The 1888-1889 New Zealand Native football team organised by Joseph Warbrick was the first overseas team to tour the Home Nations, where the team became the first New Zealand side to perform a haka during its match v Surrey,^[1] and also the first to wear an all black uniform. It was however a wholly private endeavour.

The first New Zealand Māori team given official status was selected in 1910. That year the team toured New Zealand and Australia, playing a range of combined New Zealand provinces and Australian state teams.^[1] An American Universities squad was touring Australia at the same time and two fixtures were against the New Zealand Māoris. Both were played at Sydney and were won by the New Zealanders 14-11 and 21-3 respectively. In their 19 total matches played they won 12, drew 3 and lost 4 games.

The team that toured to Europe in 1926–27

The New Zealand Māoris had not played a match outside of New Zealand or Australia until 1926, when they undertook a European tour of France, England and Wales. They also played two games in New Zealand before they left, two more in Australia on the way, and also stopped in Sri Lanka for one game before travelling to France to start the European fixtures. On the return to New Zealand they stopped in Victoria, Australia for a final game in which they won 41-3. In all there were 40 games played. The New Zealand Māoris won 30 of those, drew 2 and lost 8. Full-back George Nepia remains as the most notable player of that period.^[1]

The team was renamed the Maori All Blacks in 2012, having been previously called the New Zealand Maori and New Zealand Maoris.

The team is a selection of the best of New Zealand's Māori rugby players and boasts a proud history of defeating national sides. In matches in New Zealand in 2010 to mark one hundred years of Māori All Blacks rugby, the team defeated Ireland and England, having beaten the British and Irish Lions in 2005. Many members have gone on to play for the All Blacks.

Māori All Blacks and apartheid

New Zealand has a long history of sporting contact with South Africa, especially through rugby union. Until the 1970s this resulted in discrimination against Māori players, since the apartheid political system in South Africa for most of the twentieth century did not allow people of different races to play sport together, and therefore South African officials requested that Māori players not be included in sides which toured their country. Despite some of New Zealand's best players being Māori, this was agreed to, and Māori were excluded from tours of South Africa, including the Māori All Blacks.

Nonetheless in the early period, South Africa did play the Māori All Blacks. In April 2010 it was revealed by Muru Walters that in 1956 Ernest Corbett, Minister of Māori Affairs, had told the team to deliberately lose to the Springboks "for the future of rugby". The Māori team lost 37-0. This was followed by Walters calling for the New Zealand government to apologise for the way it treated Māori rugby players.^[2]

Professional era

British & Irish Lions playing the New Zealand Māori in 2005

The professional era in Māori rugby union began in 1994, marked the team lost only four of its 26 games played between 1994 and 2004, including beating England, Argentina, Scotland and Fiji. The Māori continued their winning form in 2004 beating the England Saxons in extra time in the final of the Churchill Cup in Canada.

One of their two annual tournaments is a competition involving the Pacific top national teams, the Pacific Nations Cup. From 2008 they replaced the Junior All Blacks, where they were undefeated champions, narrowly beating Australia A in the final game of the tournament. The Churchill Cup was another, winning in 2004 and in 2006, defeating Ireland A and the USA in pool play in Santa Clara, California and Scotland A in the final in Edmonton, Alberta.

In 2005 the Māori beat the British and Irish Lions for the first time in an official match. Their preparations for this match forced them to withdraw from the 2005 Churchill Cup. In August 2012, NZRU announced the Māori All Blacks would play three matches in the United Kingdom, including an international fixture against Canada. Jamie Joseph was coach with assistance from Daryl Gibson.^[3]

Overall

Against	Played	Won	Lost	Drawn	Win %
Argentina	2	2	0	0	100.00%
Australia	18	6	10	2	33.33%
British and Irish Lions	8	1	7	0	12.50%
Canada	6	6	0	0	100.00%
Cook Islands	1	1	0	0	100.00%
England	4	2	2	0	50.00%
Fiji	29	20	7	2	67.86%
France	2	2	0	0	100.00%
Ireland	2	2	0	0	100.00%
Japan	3	3	0	0	100.00%
New Zealand	5	0	5	0	0.00%
Samoa	10	10	0	0	100.00%
Scotland	2	2	0	0	100.00%
South Africa	4	0	3	1	0.00%
Spain	2	2	0	0	100.00%
Tonga	14	10	4	0	71.43%
United States	4	4	0	0	100.00%
Wales	2	0	2	0	0.00%
Total	118	73	40	5	61.86%

Current squad

New Zealand Māori 25-man squad for their November tour matches against the Canadian National Team and the French Barbarians.^[5] Two additional players are yet to be added.

All squad members play rugby in New Zealand.

• Head Coach – Clayton McMillan

Note: Bold denotes players that have represented the Māori All Blacks in previous tours.

Notable players