Women in Winter

Games

OF winter sports for women, hockey and basketball are the most popular team games, although golf, of course, has a large following. Both hockey and basketball, however, have claimed an increasing number of players in recent years.

The New Zealand Women’s Hockey Association was not formed until 1908, but the game had been played in several centres for some years before that, and pictures published in a Christchurch paper, dated June 1901, are of somewhat quaint interest to-day as showing the voluminous skirts and leg-of-mutton sleeves which were the paramount modes of the hockey field at that period. In spite of garments which to-day would be re­garded as excessive even for street wear on the most wintry day, the ladies seem to have displayed abundant energy. The two teams were Christchurch and Hinemoa, the latter belonging to Kaiapoi, the pioneer centre of men’s hockey. Welling­ton too had very keen hockey teams, one of the best being that of a Maori girls’ college.

Two English ladies’ hockey teams, one in 1914, captained by Miss Gascoyne, and one in 1938, captained by Miss N. Knott, have visited New Zealand, and a New Zealand team has visited Australia. The game has mainly relied, however, on local enthusiasm generated by club and interprovincial contests.

Basketball’s popularity is of more recent growth. Originated in the United States, the game was introduced into New Zealand prior to the 1914-18 War, and was first taken up by schools and bible-classes, while the Y.M.C.A. also did much to popularise it. Once its merits had been recognised, its propagation, largely by members of the school teaching profession, was simple and rapid, but it was not until the nineteen-twenties that a New Zealand Association was formed, and activities in the different centres coordinated. The New Zealand Cup for competition between first-grade representative teams was first competed for in 1926. Auckland has been the most successful centre, but Otago, Wellington, Southland, and Canterbury have all held the Cup.

A milestone in women’s basketball was the sending of a New Zealand team to Australia in 1938. Lacking experience of international rules, which require teams of seven instead of the nine-a-side game favoured in New Zealand, the team suffered some decisive defeats, but valuable experience was gained. Owing to the war, a tentative arrangement for a return visit by Australia in 1940 could not be carried out.

Two other games in which women are playing a strong part are badminton and table tennis. Both are indoor games, but are strenuous and exacting. Badminton was revived (it had been actively played here before 1914) separately in Napier, Wanganui, and Auckland, about 1926, when the first inter-club match between Napier and Wanganui was held. Soon afterwards, largely through the initiative of Mr. and Mrs. Eric Dart, of Auck­land, New Zealand championship tournaments were inaugurated, and visits between Australian and New Zealand teams have since been exchanged. An international flavour has also been imparted to table tennis, as two Hungarian teams have visited New Zealand in recent years, and a New Zealand team has visited Australia.