A century of sporting ties: India and NZ face off in the globe’s great codes

In 1926, Indian and New Zealand athletes met on hockey fields, unaware they were laying the foundations for a sporting relationship that would stretch across a century. There were no television cameras, no global audiences, no sense of historical weight. Just competition – and the quiet beginnings of connection.

One hundred years on, what started as imperial-era touring fixtures has evolved into a multi-layered sporting relationship shaped by rivalry, migration, cultural exchange and shared Commonwealth heritage.

Cricket and hockey have, at various times, carried the narrative: India’s early dominance in Olympic hockey; the rise of New Zealand cricket through figures such as Sir Richard Hadlee; the artistry of Sachin Tendulkar. And of course, the drama of modern Test series, including New Zealand’s World Test Championship triumph and landmark success in India.

But to tell the story through those lenses alone is to overlook the bigger picture of what has unfolded.

Because the real story lies in the accumulation – in the dozens of sports, the hundreds of encounters and the thousands of athletes who have crossed paths over generations.

Football, squash, tennis, weightlifting, bowls, kabaddi and badminton – each has contributed its own thread to a relationship that has rarely stood still.

Some contests have been dramatic, even defining; others have gone almost unnoticed yet have helped form an enduring connection.

If cricket and hockey provided the early pillars, the Commonwealth Games became the great meeting ground – a recurring stage on which New Zealand and India would test themselves against each other across an ever-expanding range of disciplines.

When Christchurch hosted the 1974 Commonwealth Games, it did so with a sense of occasion befitting a small nation stepping confidently onto the world stage. India arrived with a team of just 20 athletes but left with a medal haul that spoke to growing ambition: 15 medals, including four gold, and an overall sixth-place finish on the medal table.

New Zealand, buoyed by home support, collected 35 medals to finish fourth, a reminder of the host nation’s own rising confidence in international sport.

By the time Auckland hosted the Games in 1990, the dynamic had shifted again. India’s emergence in weightlifting, particularly in the lighter men’s divisions, was impossible to ignore. Lifters such as Ponnuswamy Rangaswamy, Parvesh Chander Sharma and Paramjit Sharma delivered gold medals, helping India to finish fifth overall.

Throughout the 1990s, at the Games in Victoria, Canada (1994) and Kuala Lumpur (1998), the two nations found themselves regularly competing in weightlifting arenas. The contests were technical, often intense, and rarely headline-grabbing – but they mattered.

When Delhi hosted the Commonwealth Games in 2010, the spotlight fell firmly on India. It would become the country’s most successful Games, yielding 101 medals, including 39 gold.

Yet within that success lies a uniquely New Zealand story – one that speaks to the deeper layers of sporting connection.

Less than two years before the Games, there were no lawn bowling greens in Delhi. The sport was part of the programme, but the infrastructure simply did not exist. Enter Bill Fowlie, a New Zealander tasked by World Bowls with overseeing the construction of facilities and the organisation of competition. It was an immense logistical challenge, requiring not only technical expertise but diplomacy, persistence and trust.

Fowlie delivered. Greens were built at the prestigious Delhi Public School RK Puram. The competition went ahead.

And then, quietly, the legacy began.

Among those who would benefit from the new facilities was a local teacher, Pinki Singh. With access to world-class greens on her doorstep, she developed her game in a way that would not have been possible before.

Twelve years later, at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, Singh was part of the Indian women’s fours team that defeated New Zealand in the semifinals on the way to gold. New Zealand took bronze.

It was an outcome shaped, in part, by a New Zealander’s contribution more than a decade earlier – a reminder that sporting influence is not always immediate, and not always linear.

The 2010 Games in Delhi also produced direct competition between the two nations. India’s men’s hockey team claimed silver while the New Zealand men’s took bronze. In the women’s tournament, New Zealand secured silver – another example of the two nations pushing each other on a global stage.

While celebrated Indian para-athlete and activist Deepa Malik missed out on a medal at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, she would go on to win silver in shot put at the IPC World Para Athletics Championship in Christchurch the following year. Malik, who is paralysed from the chest down and only began her sporting career at 30, would make history at the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, becoming the first Indian woman to win a silver medal at the Paralympics, again for shot put.

Malik’s achievements across numerous sports and her activism for disability rights and inclusion in sport made her a natural choice for the 2019 Sir Edmund Hillary Fellowship and a ’citizen ambassador’ to New Zealand. Malik toured Auckland and Wellington in 2019, where she met with organisations and community groups.

In more recent decades, squash has emerged as one of the most consistently compelling arenas for New Zealand-India competition.

At the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, India’s pairing of Joshna Chinappa and Dipika Pallikal surged to gold in the women’s doubles, defeating England in the final.

Along the way, they beat New Zealand’s Joelle King and Amanda Landers-Murphy in a tight quarterfinal.

Four years later, on the Gold Coast, the New Zealand duo responded. In a final that carried the weight of unfinished business, King and Landers-Murphy defeated Chinappa and Pallikal to claim the gold.

By the 2022 Birmingham Games, the rivalry had deepened further. Joelle King and Paul Coll combined to win mixed doubles gold, overcoming India’s top-seeded combination of Saurav Ghosal and Pallikal. Coll also defeated Ghosal in the men’s singles semifinals before going on to secure gold.

The exchanges were not just competitive – they were personal, shaped by familiarity and mutual respect.

Football, for all its global reach, has provided relatively few direct meetings between New Zealand and India. Yet when those encounters have occurred, they have carried significance beyond the result.

The first meeting came in 1981 at Malaysia’s Merdeka Tournament, ending in a scoreless draw. It would be more than 40 years before the two sides would meet again, this time at the Intercontinental Cup in Mumbai in 2022, where New Zealand edged out India 2–1.

But the deeper story lies not in the fixtures themselves, but in the growing intersection between sport and migration.

Few football players of Indian descent have represented New Zealand at the senior level. The first, goalkeeper Praven Jerram, played for the New Zealand men’s team in the 1970s while Sapreet Singh was only the second, making his debut for the All Whites against India in 2022. Maja Hahn and Emma Pijnenburg have more recently played for the Football Ferns.

Born in Auckland to Punjabi parents, Singh’s debut for the All Whites came against India – a moment layered with personal and cultural meaning.

“To be a Singh and come back and play in India, against India, was really special,” he told The Times of India in 2025.

Singh is widely followed in India. When New Zealand qualified for the 2026 FIFA World cup he joked in an interview with World Soccer magazine, “If you look at my socials, you would think India have qualified for the World Cup and not New Zealand!”

It was said with humour, but spoke to something deeper – a connection that now extends well beyond national teams.

Singh’s rise would take him to Europe, where he signed with Bayern Munich in 2019, becoming the first player of Indian heritage to join one of football’s most storied clubs.

While injuries would limit his impact at the highest level, Singh’s broader significance has endured. In an interview with The Times of India, he spoke of what it meant to have become a role model for footballers of Indian heritage.

“It’s truly humbling that I’m in a position to inspire Indian and South Asian footballers in general.

“As I’ve grown older, I’ve become more appreciative of the importance of representation.”

“I represent a lot of people. I want to try and create a pathway for future Indian players; I hope it can lead for future players to go through and do their thing.”

Few stories better capture the cultural dimension of the relationship than the rise of kabaddi in New Zealand.

A traditional Indian sport, kabaddi first appeared in New Zealand in 1990 with a tournament in Hamilton. For many years it remained a niche pursuit, sustained largely within Punjabi and Sikh communities.

Then, in 2012, came a turning point.

South Auckland dairy owner Tara Singh Bains set out to form a New Zealand women’s team. Drawing on networks across communities – including local marae – he brought together athletes from rugby union, rugby league and touch.

They had the physicality. What they lacked was experience.

That became clear when they arrived at the 2013 World Cup in India.

“We were just playing against ourselves with our own strategies,” recalled player Riri Motu.

“So going into that first game against India was a big shock.”

The sport’s simplicity – no ball, bare feet, hard surfaces – belied its complexity.

“We were thinking, why aren’t people just picking them up and chucking them out? But it wasn’t as easy as we thought when we met them face-to-face.”

And yet, somehow, they thrived.

New Zealand finished runners-up to India in that tournament, stunning the kabaddi world. They repeated the feat in 2016 and secured bronze in 2019.

For Motu, however, the defining memory was not the result, but the reception.

“It was like they loved us. We were like superstars. It was overwhelming.”

She saw echoes of Māori values in the hospitality.

“I think about it in terms of manaakitanga – the respect, the care, making sure you’re looked after. That was exactly what we experienced.”

In 2021, a purpose-built kabaddi stadium opened in Takanini at the Sri Kalgidhar Sahib Gurdwara (New Zealand’s largest Sikh temple) – believed to be the only dedicated facility of its kind outside India. By 2025, the New Zealand men’s team had claimed victory at an international tournament hosted there.

What began as a transplanted sport had become something embedded in New Zealand sporting life.

Competition between New Zealand and India has played out on the badminton court on a regular basis, with the first competition believed to have taken place in 1963 when India came to New Zealand to play a Thomas Cup tie. The Cup is sometimes referred to as the World Men’s Team Championships.

The two countries met again in another Thomas Cup tie in New Zealand in 1972. There have also been a handful of player exchanges.

In 1969, New Zealand player Richard Purser was invited to India to compete in a series of international tournaments over a three-week period.

India competed at the 1974 Commonwealth Games in Christchurch, where Prakash Padukone, considered a pioneer of Indian badminton, reached the quarterfinals.

The two nations have also played one another in the Uber Cup, known as the World Women’s Team Championships.

During the late-1990s and early-2000s, the two countries were often very competitive with one another, particularly in team events.

In recent years, India has become a leading badminton nation with several men’s and women’s players featuring in the upper echelons of the world rankings. Although opportunities to compete still exist, results are generally more one-sided in India’s favour.

That said, one of the standout moments for New Zealand came at the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester, when New Zealand beat India 3–2 in the mixed team event.

The tie came down to the final match, with Rhona Robertson and Tammy Jenkins winning the deciding doubles match in a dramatic fifth game, guaranteeing New Zealand a bronze medal in the team competition.

Earlier that year, New Zealand beat India 3–2 in the Uber Cup qualifier in the Netherlands, showing just how evenly matched the two countries were at the time.

There are also a couple of Indian players who left a lasting impression on the New Zealand badminton fraternity.

While Prakash Padukone was knocked out in the quarterfinals of the 1974 Commonwealth Games in Christchurch, he would go on to win gold at the 1978 Games and would become the first Indian player to win the All England Open in 1980. Padukone was renowned for his incredible deception and skill on the court.

Syed Modi, who won gold at the Commonwealth Games in Brisbane in 1982, also played in New Zealand at an Auckland invitation event in the mid-1980s and is remembered as an outstanding player and personality in the sport.

Long before global tours and television audiences, tennis provided another avenue for connection.

Indian star Vijay Amritraj won the 1977 New Zealand Open singles title, defeating American Tim Wilkison in the final. Alongside his brother Anand, he also enjoyed doubles success against New Zealand opponents, including Onny Parun and Jeff Simpson.

It was part of a broader era in which both nations were carving out their identities in international tennis – often crossing paths in the process.

Over the past 30 years, Indian players have generally enjoyed greater success on the global stage.

Leander Paes made history when he won a bronze medal at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics in the men’s singles.

Rohan Bopanna won his first men’s major title when he won the doubles at the 2024 Australian Open and, at the age of 43, also became the oldest No 1 in ATP doubles history.

Sania Mirza is India’s most successful female tennis player having won six Grand Slam titles – three in women’s doubles and three in mixed doubles. She also held the world No 1 ranking in doubles for nearly two years.

In 1997, Mahesh Bhupathi made history as the first Indian to win a Grand Slam title when he claimed the 1997 French Open mixed doubles.

A standout for New Zealand in recent years though has been Erin Routliffe – wining the US Open women’s doubles titles in 2023 and 2025, as well as the 2024 WTA Finals. She was also runner-up at Wimbledon in 2024 and became the first New Zealand woman to reach the world No 1 ranking in women’s doubles in July 2024.

In recent times, contests between New Zealand and India in tennis have been somewhat sporadic. The 2015 Davis Cup Asia/Oceania group tie in Christchurch is one example of a relatively recent New Zealand-India confrontation.

After day one the encounter was level, at 1–1 in the singles. New Zealand then surprisingly won the doubles with Marcus Daniel and Rubin Statham shocking India’s world top 10 pairing of Rohan Bopana and Saketh Myeni in straight sets.

Daniel thought that was his effort was done for the tournament with Statham and Michael Venus set to play the final reverse singles.

“That night I was having dinner with my parents, having a glass of wine because I was like, ’Oh, I did a great job today and got the job done and tomorrow I will just go out and support the team’. ”

“Then I got a tap on the shoulder from the team captain and [Rubin] had gone down sick and it was like, ’Hey, you’re up first tomorrow’. I hadn’t played a singles match at this stage for something like three years.”

“I had to go out there on the slowest hard court and play [Somdev Devvarman] a guy who was known as being the fastest man around … and I was a serve and volley player.

“So it was the worst combination of things. Only clay would have been worse. I lost but it was a good match and I just put everything of myself into [it].”

India went on to win the tie 3–2.

History shows Indian players have excelled at doubles play and Daniel feels that comes down to being “extremely skillful with their hands” and “deft around the net which lends itself well to doubles”.

Daniel says there has been plenty of crossover at times between New Zealand and Indian players teaming up in doubles as their skills are complementary.

“But not only do your games have to be complementary, you need to get on with the people as well.”

“There’s something in that, perhaps our battling natures? Perhaps also a built-in humility … and feeling there’s an element of needing to prove yourself in a country where [tennis] is not as high up the totem pole as other sports.”

While 1926 marks the start of official sporting ties between New Zealand and India with that inaugural hockey tour, there are connections that predate it.

Two early All Blacks – Harry Braddon and Maurice Herrold – were both born in Kolkata in the 19th century. Their stories sit as quiet reminders that the ties between the two nations run deeper than fixtures and tournaments.

They speak to movement, migration and the long arc of shared history.

‘Today, the relationship continues to evolve in ways that would have been unimaginable a century ago. ’

Migration has reshaped the sporting landscape. Athletes of Indian heritage now represent New Zealand across multiple codes. Indian athletes compete regularly in events hosted in Aotearoa. Cultural exchange is no longer incidental – it is central. Nor is the connection defined by official tours alone. It lives in communities, in pathways and in shared experiences.

What began as competition has become an ongoing conversation.

And if the past 100 years have shown anything, it is that the most meaningful sporting relationships are not built on isolated moments of brilliance, but on the accumulation of encounters, generation after generation.

The next century of New Zealand-India sporting ties is already underway. And, like the first, it will likely begin in ways that seem small until history gives them their weight.