Nelson City Council

Nelson is proud to have played a defining role in New Zealand Rugby history. Nelson

• hosted the first ever game under recognised Rugby rules in May 1870
• is the birthplace of the father of New Zealand Rugby, Charles Monro
• is home to New Zealand's first rugby club, the Nelson Rugby Football Club

Charles Monro returned from London in early 1870 at the age of 19 after being introduced to the game while at Christ's College. He suggested the Nelson Rugby Football Club and Nelson College play a match using English rules. Monro later wrote the games had been played with oval balls, ones that he may very well have brought with him when he returned home that year.

And so it was that at the Botanics Reserve, Nelson on Saturday 14 May 1870, the first Rugby match in New Zealand was played in front of about 200 spectators. With 18 players each side, including ten forwards, three half-backs, three three-quarters, and two fullbacks, the Nelson Rugby Football Club got the better of Nelson College on the day and won the match two goals to nil.

The local paper of the day, the Nelson Examiner, referred to the game as the first football match of the season, not mentioning that it was in fact a Rugby game, let alone the first one ever played in the country.

Afterwards, Rugby began to be introduced into other areas around the country, beginning withWellington, Wanganui, Auckland and Taranaki.

Content sourced from 'They Gave Us Rugby,' by Alan Turley, Nelson College publisher, 1996.