Tomoana Showgrounds
Hastings, Hawke's Bay, New Zealand
Tomoana Showgrounds, Hastings, New Zealand — opened 1911, 5 rugby league games hosted, home of Hawke's Bay (NZRL provincial representative side).
Sourcing caveat: No attendance figures were found for three of the five matches (1976, 1992, 1996) in either Rugby League Project or any secondary source.
Ground facts
| Opened | 1911 (The Hawke's Bay Agricultural & Pastoral Society purchased 62 acres of the site in 1911 (more land added 1934); its first official agricultural show was held there in 1925. The ground was already in general community/sporting use in the gap between the 1911 land purchase and the first formal show, which is when its earliest rugby league match (1919) falls. Named after a nearby railway station renamed "Tomoana" by local Maori in 1881. Now a Hastings District Council-owned multi-use events venue and home to the Hawke's Bay Farmers' Market; the old grandstand has been reported for demolition in recent years.) |
| Home club | Hawke's Bay (NZRL provincial representative side) |
| Games hosted (rugby league, on record) | 5 |
| Top recorded crowd | 5,000 |
| Years used | 1919–1996 |
| Location | Hastings, Hawke's Bay |
Name history
- Tomoana Showgrounds — 1911-2010s
- Showgrounds Hawke's Bay — 2010s (rebranding)
- Tomoana Showgrounds — 2017-present (traditional name restored)
Rugby league history
Despite the generic "Showgrounds" component of its name -- the kind that has previously caused data-contamination problems elsewhere in this directory -- every one of Tomoana's five recorded matches was individually checked against Rugby League Project's team- and tour-level pages and confirmed as genuinely Hastings-specific, including correctly distinguishing this venue from a separate Hawke's Bay vs Australia fixture played the same week in 1919 at a different Napier ground. The five matches span from an early Kangaroos tour fixture in 1919 (Hawke's Bay lost 7-73, attendance 1,000) through a 1976 Combined Sydney tour match, a 1980 NZ Maori vs Australia game (attendance 5,000, the ground's top crowd), a 1992 Hawke's Bay vs Papua New Guinea tour match, and a 1996 NZ Maori vs Papua New Guinea fixture -- almost entirely representative and touring-side matches rather than any full New Zealand Kiwis home Test.
Sources
Data last verified: 11 August 2026.
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