Sport in New Zealand largely reflects its British colonial heritage, with some of the most popular sports being rugby, cricket and netball which are primarily played in Commonwealth of Nations countries. New Zealand is a small nation but has enjoyed success in many sports, notably rugby union (the national sport), rugby league, cricket (considered the national summer sport), America’s Cup sailing, world championship and Olympics events and motorsport.
Other popular sports include netball, basketball, golf, tennis, rowing and a variety of water sports, particularly sailing and surf sports. Winter sports such as skiing and snowboarding are also popular as are indoor and outdoor bowls.
Read more about Sport In New Zealand: Participation Rates
Famous quotes containing the words sport in, sport and/or zealand:
“Sport inevitably creates deadness of feeling. No one could take pleasure in it who was sensitive to suffering; and therefore its pursuit by women is much more to be regretted than its pursuit by men, because women pursue much more violently and recklessly what they pursue at all.”
—Ouida [Marie Louise De La Ramée] (1839–1908)
“Every American travelling in England gets his own individual sport out of the toy passenger and freight trains and the tiny locomotives, with their faint, indignant, tiny whistle. Especially in western England one wonders how the business of a nation can possibly be carried on by means so insufficient.”
—Willa Cather (1876–1947)
“Teasing is universal. Anthropologists have found the same fundamental patterns of teasing among New Zealand aborigine children and inner-city kids on the playgrounds of Philadelphia.”
—Lawrence Kutner (20th century)