League of their own: the NRL Indigenous All Stars vs Maori match is much more than a novelty

This weekend’s National Rugby League clash between the Indigenous All Stars and the New Zealand Maori men’s and women’s sides marks a decade-and-a-half of recognising a unique aspect of the trans-Tasman game.

First staged in 2010, the season-opening fixture was not conceived as a marketing stunt, but as a deliberate exercise in showcasing Indigenous excellence and its contribution to the competition.

The match centres Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander players, and their culture and leadership at the highest level of the game. The rationale was clear from the outset: Indigenous Australians were – and remain – significantly over-represented relative to their share of the national population.

In 2010, the NRL reported that more than 12% of its playing group identified as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander, despite Indigenous Australians making up less than 3% of the population.

More recent estimates suggest that proportion has increased, now sitting closer to 15% across the men’s and women’s NRL games, while accounting for less than 4% of the general population.

But what began as recognition of that over-representation has since evolved into something more relational, collective and trans-Tasman. It now reflects broader Indigenous leadership traditions in elite sport that prioritise whakapapa (genealogy), collective responsibility and cultural authority.

Women players on the rise

A major turning point came in 2019 when the Indigenous All Stars first played the New Zealand Maori team instead of an NRL or world side. This reframed the fixture as an Indigenous-to-Indigenous contest across the Tasman, rather than simply an Australian brand.

While the men’s Indigenous All Stars match began as the centrepiece, the women’s fixture has become one of the event’s most structurally important expressions, reflecting the rapid growth of the National Women’s Rugby League (NRLW).

Demographic patterns in the women’s game are particularly pronounced, with NRL inclusion data showing roughly 48% of NRLW players identify as Maori or Pasifika, with a further 14% identifying as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander.

These figures show the women’s Indigenous All Stars team is not an add-on. It functions as a legitimate pathway, leadership platform and cultural anchor for a competition whose future growth depends heavily on Indigenous and Pasifika participation and whanau (family) engagement.

Within the NRL, Maori players are typically counted within broader Polynesian or Pasifika demographic categories. Recent analyses suggest Polynesian players now account for close to, and potentially more than, 50% of the top tier of NRL contracts.

Maori comprise about 17% of the overall New Zealand population, and Pasifika peoples make up a further 8%. On NRL rosters, those proportions are largely inverted.

Combined with those identifying as having Indigenous Australian and/or Torres Strait Islander heritage, a clear majority – around 62% – of NRL players now come from Indigenous Australian/Torres Strait Islander, Maori and Pasifika backgrounds.

An Indigenous State of Origin?

As Indigenous sport researchers and practitioners, we work to highlight the importance of culture to professional rugby league.

That 62% of players also represents a huge, vibrant fan base. Collectively, this Indigenous influence is the opposite of the cultural tokenism that can be found in many Eurocentric sports systems.

The unprecedented success of last year’s NRL Pacific Championships, particularly the extraordinary match between Samoa and Tonga, further illustrated this shift.

With the disproportionate number of Pacific athletes who make the NRL the spectacle it is, perhaps it’s time for the sport’s gatekeepers to consider a three-game series, modelled on State of Origin.

This would bring together Maori, Pacific and Indigenous all-star sides. With players clearly expressing their pride in the All Stars game, it would be a fitting showcase.

The success of the Pacific Championships suggests there is also potential for including Maori and Indigenous Australian teams in an extended format that would better reflect the cultural and playing realities of the modern game.

Both would offer a competitively legitimate platform for this key group of rugby league superstars, and would meaningfully recognise their long-term cultural and commercial value to the game.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.