New Zealand women's national rugby union team

The team's nickname combines the colour black and the silver fern, which are iconic New Zealand sporting symbols. For example, the All Blacks is New Zealand's famous men's rugby team, the Black Caps is the men's cricket team, the White Ferns is the women's cricket team, while the Silver Ferns is the national women's netball team.

Starting with the inaugural International Rugby Board (IRB)-sponsored Cup in 1998, the Black Ferns won four consecutive World Cups, including the 2002 World Cup in Barcelona, the 2006 World Cup in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, and the 2010 World Cup in London, England. Most recently, the Black Ferns have won their 5th World Cup, beating the English team in Belfast on 27 August 2017.[2]

The Black Ferns have participated in most WRWC events since its inauguration in 1991, only missing the 1994 championship in Scotland. They also won the Canada Cup in 1996, 2000, and 2005, and the Churchill Cup in 2004.

Farah Palmer was captain of the Ferns from 1997 to 2005, when she lost her captaincy due to a shoulder injury. That year, she was honoured as International Women's (Rugby) Personality of the Year at the IRB Awards. For the 5th Women's Rugby World Cup in Canada, Palmer fought her way back into the team and again led the it to World Cup victory. After the win, Palmer announced her retirement from the Black Ferns in September 2006.[3]

From 2002 until their last game of 2009, the Black Ferns enjoyed a streak of 24 consecutive test match wins spanning almost 9 years.

While rugby is the most popular spectator game in New Zealand, the Black Ferns have suffered in the past from similar problems to any women's sport: under-funding, lack of support and lack of publicity. The New Zealand Rugby Union (NZRU) and IRB have been criticised for not doing more to promote women's rugby, although support is beginning to improve in those organisations, in large part due to the Ferns' successes. The NZRU started funding the Black Ferns in 1995, thus giving a great boost to their game. Accordingly, the Black Ferns have benefitted from being included in NZRU High Performance initiatives. Along with professional coaches the team has had access to professional development resources such as analysis. In more recent times, the team's profile has risen greatly at a grassroots level, due in great part to their string of successes, and it is increasingly seen to be a national team on the same basis as any other.

In January 2010, the Women's Provincial Championship (WPC) came under severe threat after the NZRU announced that the championship series would have to go due to budget cuts. As the championship was a prime builder of training, skill and competition for New Zealand women's rugby, the decision was a shock for players and supporters, including former captain Farah Palmer (especially since it was a World Cup year).[4] NZRU said women's domestic rugby was one of many victims of the tight financial times. They faced a barrage of criticism for their decision, and eventually reinstated the WPC after the Black Ferns won the 2010 World Cup.

The WPC was renamed the Farah Palmer Cup in 2016, in honour of the influential former captain.

In 2018, after the success of New Zealand women's national rugby sevens team, all Sevens and Black Ferns players have been offered semi-professional contracts. They also played the first Test series against Australian Walleroos, which was played on the same night as the Men's Bledisloe Cup Tests.

The 2018 season finished with a 1–1 drawn series against France, with France becoming only the fourth team in the world to beat the Black Ferns. The Black Ferns' loss in the final game of the year ended a 17-month long winning streak and was also the final game for captain Fa’amausili, who retired from international rugby.[5]

In 2019, the Black Ferns won the annual Women's Rugby Super Series for the second time.

New Zealand will host the 2021 Women's Rugby World Cup after beating out neighbour Australia for the rights.[6] New Zealand automatically qualified for the 2021 event as host.

The Black Ferns perform a haka (a Māori challenge) before every international match. Until the present year, the Black Ferns performed the haka Ko Uhia Mai, specially composed by the respected Māori rugby leader, Te Whetū Tipiwai.

The first four games listed below – played at RugbyFest 1990 – are not generally accepted as being internationals by New Zealand authorities. However, in men's rugby it is general practice to award full international status to any games where ONE side considers a game to be an international. As a result all games in that tournament have been treated as full internationals in this article.

Overall

Women's World Rugby Rankings
Top 20 rankings as of 18 April 2022[7]
Rank	Change*	Team	Points
1		England	096.26
2		New Zealand	088.58
3		France	088.43
4		Canada	088.15
5		Australia	078.68
6		United States	076.63
7	1	Ireland	076.00
8	1	Italy	075.12
9		Wales	073.63
10		Scotland	072.72
11		Spain	072.10
12		Japan	065.49
13		South Africa	063.39
14		Russia	061.10
15		Samoa	059.72
16		Kazakhstan	058.45
17		Netherlands	058.27
18		Hong Kong	057.89
19		Sweden	057.73
20		Germany	057.72
*Change from the previous week

See also: List of New Zealand women's national rugby union team matches

(Full internationals only)

Rugby: New Zealand internationals from 1990

Opponent	First game	Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	Win %	For	Aga	Diff
Australia	1994	19	19	0	0	100%	715	129	+586
Canada	1991	15	15	0	0	100%	619	133	+486
England	1997	29	18	1	10	62.1%	652	449	+203
France	1996	9	5	0	4	55.6%	301	139	+162
Germany	1998	2	2	0	0	100%	251	6	+245
Hong Kong	2017	1	1	0	0	100%	121	0	+121
Ireland	2014	2	1	0	1	50%	52	25	+27
Kazakhstan	2014	1	1	0	0	100%	79	5	+74
Netherlands	1990	1	1	0	0	100%	56	0	+56
Samoa	2006	2	2	0	0	100%	140	12	+128
Scotland	1998	3	3	0	0	100%	127	9	+118
South Africa	2010	1	1	0	0	100%	55	3	+52
Spain	1998	1	1	0	0	100%	46	3	+43
Soviet Union	1990	1	1	0	0	100%	8	0	+8
United States	1990	13	12	0	1	92.3%	567	75	+492
Wales	1991	4	4	0	0	100%	172	33	+139
World XV	1990	3	3	0	0	100%	87	22	+65
Summary	1990	107	90	1	16	84.1%	4048	1043	+3005

Rugby World Cup

Main article: Rugby World Cup (women's)

Rugby World Cup
Year	Round	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	Squad
1991	Third place	3	2	0	1	48	21	Squad
1994	Did not participate due to late tournament cancellation
1998	Champions	5	5	0	0	344	32	Squad
2002	Champions	4	4	0	0	202	12	Squad
2006	Champions	5	5	0	0	202	34	Squad
2010	Champions	5	5	0	0	186	33	Squad
2014	Fifth place	5	4	0	1	245	37	Squad
2017	Champions	5	5	0	0	299	61	Squad
2021
Total	Champions	32	30	0	2	1526	230
Champions    Runners-up    Third place    Fourth place Home venue

New Zealand have won the World Cup five times. They defeated the United States in the final of the 1998 World Cup held in the Netherlands to claim their maiden title. They followed this up with three more consecutive titles, overcoming England in the final of the next three editions; 2002, 2006 and 2010, as well as in their fifth world title in 2017. They lost to eventual winners the United States in the semi-final of the inaugural competition held in Wales in 1991, but were absent from the following tournament in 1994 Women's Rugby World Cup, due to the late cancellation of the event. In 2014 Women's Rugby World Cup, they lost a pool game to Ireland,[8] while the top two teams in another pool drew their match. This saw them miss out on the semi-finals by a single table point, before going on to heavily defeat Wales and the United States to finish the tournament in fifth.

All head coaches of the Black Ferns (1990-Present). Every Black Fern coach has been a New Zealander.

List of women's international rugby union test matches – the most complete listing of all women's international results since 1982.

• Curtin, Jennifer (2016). "Before the 'Black Ferns': Tracing the Beginnings of Women's Rugby in New Zealand". The International Journal of the History of Sport. 33 (17): 2071–2085. doi:10.1080/09523367.2017.1329201. S2CID 148962837.

• Official website