25 Apr 2015

The soldier-making game: Sport in WW1

From Anzac Day, 1:30 pm on 25 April 2015

cricket
During the 1915 Gallipoli evacuation a cricket match was staged to disguise the withdrawal. Image courtesy of the War Graves Commission.

In 1902 one of New Zealand's very first All Blacks called rugby "the good, manly and soldier-making game". We explore the role of sport in WW1 with sport historian Greg Ryan and Dr Ron Palenski, chief executive of the New Zealand Hall of Fame.