Brendon McCullum in fine form at Eden Park. Photo / Getty Images
Brendon McCullum in fine form at Eden Park. Photo / Getty Images
Auckland’s sports grounds are also national icons but, as Suzanne McFadden reveals, they had humble beginnings and face a new future.
If Eden Park had been stuck with its original name, the commentary at today's Cricket World Cup showdown between New Zealand and Australia could have sounded quite different.
"That's a mighty six from Brendon McCullum, right on top of the ASB Stand at Ryan's Folly."
Ryan's Folly? It was the first title given to a swampy, rock-strewn Mt Eden paddock that blacksmith and ardent cricketer Harry Ryan envisaged would make an ideal sports ground. After 112 years, New Zealand's premier sports stadium remains (though there were some who would rather have seen Eden Park replaced by a waterfront stadium whose vast expense and practicality was never tested).
Incidentally, the park was formally named after George Eden - the first and last Earl of Auckland - who lent his name to a city he never visited and a sports ground he never knew existed.
Eden Park has been the backdrop to a fair share of New Zealand's great sporting conquests - among them, two Rugby World Cup triumphs for the All Blacks, Yvette Williams' long jump gold in the 1950 Empire Games, and historic Kiwi cricket victories. Hockey, soccer, athletics, rugby league and even gymnastics have also taken centre-field in the past century.
There have been dark and divisive moments too - New Zealand embarrassingly skittled for 26 by England in 1955 (still the lowest test score in cricket history); or the flour bombs that dusted the pitch in the All Blacks v Springboks test of 1981.
But Harry Ryan can't be held responsible for any of those. His legacy was transforming John Walters' cow paddock into a playing field that would become New Zealand's largest sporting arena.
According to Eden Park: A History, Ryan and his friends leased the land in 1902, and formed the Eden Cricket Club. But, before the first game was played, Ryan set down a rule to help make the ground playable. "It was one of the unwritten laws of the club that every member who came to practise should take at least one stone off the ground with him when he went home and, in this way, the ground was gradually cleared," the book states.
The ground would become home to Auckland Cricket and Auckland Rugby, and host its first international event in 1921, when the All Blacks lost to the Springboks, 9-5.
The eyes of the Commonwealth turned to Eden Park in 1950 for the opening ceremony of the first Empire Games since World War II. More than 40,000 spectators packed into the park to watch the New Zealand team march - among them war veteran Harold Nelson, who would win gold in the six mile race in that stadium the next day. In danger of dissolving, the Games were embraced by Aucklanders, to live on as the Commonwealth Games.
The scene of the Games' cycling and the closing ceremony, Western Springs was a natural amphitheatre; it was converted from a swamp into a multi-sports stadium in 1929. Unemployed relief workers built concrete terraces, a cycle track and New Zealand's first all-weather cinder running track - with a rugby field in the centre oval. But cycling and speedway truly made the Springs their home.
Now it's earmarked for a $12 million upgrade to become a "boutique cricket ground", home of test cricket in Auckland, in a major reshuffle of the city's stadiums. In a contentious game of musical benches, the proposal would see speedway move to Mt Smart Stadium, and the Warriors - who've been domiciled at Mt Smart since they first played in the NRL 20 years ago - crossing the harbour bridge to QBE Stadium in Albany.
Built in the quarried shell of the volcanic cone Rarotonga, Mt Smart was opened in 1965 as a first-class athletics stadium. It underwent a facelift before the 1990 Commonwealth Games, when it was the venue for track and field, and the opening and closing ceremonies.
The New Zealand Warriors' first game was played there before 30,000 fans in 1995, but league's sentimental home was across town at Carlaw Park. Its story began in the 1920s, when volunteers with picks, shovels and horses, converted a Chinese market garden at the bottom of Parnell into a league ground. The Kiwis would play 59 tests there between 1924 and 1995, but the old stands fell into disrepair, and it was relegated to a city car park.
Virtually next door, the ASB Tennis Centre has only grown in stature. The Stanley St courts, founded around the same time as Carlaw Park, were built on top of an old rubbish tip. By 1956, it was host to a men's and women's international tournament, which evolved into today's high-profile ASB Classic and Heineken Men's Open.
Have you got your portable grand stand?
Peter Jones scores a try in the 4th test of the 1956 South Africa tour.
At 5am on July 26, 1930, the queue began outside Eden Park. By lunchtime 35,000 fans — then the largest crowd to have assembled for a rugby test in New Zealand — were ready to watch the All Blacks play the British Lions.
Although it was a 2.30pm kick-off, the gates opened at 8.30am and thousands flooded in to nab their spots on the concrete terraces and grass embankments. Hawkers were banned from selling "portable grandstands" — small wooden crates — to afford those standing a better view.
Auckland had never witnessed such traffic — special trains brought 3000 people into the city; an extra 92 trams carried 10,000 rugby fans to the park.
For the record, all trains arrived on time.
Braving sporadic showers, people sat on the roofs of trams and nearby houses, hung out of trees and stood on street signs just to steal a free glimpse of the action.
It was legendary All Black fullback George Nepia's penultimate test and his side — wearing white for the first time to avoid a clash with the Lions' blue — won 15-10. Forget the Mexican wave. A Herald reporter documented a new kind of celebration whenever the All Blacks scored. "Hats and coats were flung up, and several sections of the hill crowd supplied a new factor by whirling 'confetti', evidently manufactured on the spot out of newspaper."
But the largest crowd in Eden Park's history remains the 61,240 in September 1956 — many of whom stood like packed sardines on the embankments to witness the All Blacks' historic 11-5 victory over South Africa, securing their first series win over the Springboks.
It was also birth of the "Scotsman's stands" — the rickety wooden grandstands erected outside the ground in neighbouring yards. Most were ordered to be pulled down in the 1960s, but one — Monica O'Sullivan's "Irishman's stand" in Cricket Ave, famous for serving patrons beer in china cups, survived until the 1990s.
To celebrate Auckland's 175th anniversary, its demisemiseptcentennial, the nzherald is celebrating the growth of the city with a look at more uniquely Auckland icons, in association with the ASB.
