After the dawn match, the team visited Te Waimate Mission in Waimate North, which is recognised as an early site of Māori-Pākehā relationships.
Te Waimate Mission was established in 1830 as a model farming village – complete with a flour mill, blacksmiths, printery, carpenter’s shop, school and church. Reverend Samuel Marsden led it with the agreement of local Ngāpuhi chiefs.
The site was fitting for Te Tai Tokerau Tāne as the Tohu Whenua, cared for by Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga, is where another historical game of cricket took place.
“This second documented game was held on the mission’s grounds where freed enslaved people played together after working on the mission property,” Geaney said.
“The game showed a connection between Māori and Pākehā as children were also playing.”
Geaney said cricket has been a bicultural game since its 1832 inception, although he acknowledged the sport still had some colonial overtones.
Te Tai Tokerau Tāne player Harry Darkins became aware of the sport’s history during his 30 years playing.
“Cricket was introduced here during colonisation at a time when Māori voices, culture and identity were often pushed to the margins,” he said.
“You can still feel traces of that today in the structures of the game, in the under-representation of Māori and in the sense that cricket wasn’t originally built for us.”
Darkins said that was the baggage many players still carried when stepping on to the field.
“What I have learned is that we can process that history by reframing the game through our own values.”
For Darkins, cricket has always been about whānau.
“ … Playing with their pride behind me, playing with their pride on my skin, knowing I never walk out there alone.”
He believed whakapapa, connection and belonging all had an important role in the sport.
“That’s why it’s so powerful to see younger Māori players coming through … It shows how we as Māori are transforming cricket, bringing mana, manaakitanga and identity into a space that once excluded us.”
Northland’s men’s Māori cricket team playing a match on Horotutu Beach, Paihia, which is the site of the country’s first documented cricket game.
Darkins has seen in the past 30 years Māori representation grow on the field and in coaching. The shift is empowering, he said.
“It shows we have turned a colonial legacy into a platform for identity and pride.”
Geaney hoped the tāne’s tour would create a buzz and that the Northland Māori team would begin a resurgence of Māori representation at all levels of the game.
“Cricket has definitely changed to become a multicultural game in New Zealand; however, our Māori playing numbers do not match population numbers, and this is something we are working hard to address,” he said.