Player Hilda Mariu

[mt.wellington]

Hilda Mariu

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Hilda Peters (born 9 August 1983) is a New Zealand rugby league footballer who plays for the New Zealand Warriors in the NRL Women's Premiership.

Primarily a winger, she is a New Zealand representative.

Born in Auckland, Peters began playing rugby league when she was 19. Her younger sisters, Rona and Kahurangi, are also New Zealand Test representatives.

Peters, who is of Māori descent, has a moko kauae (a traditional Māori face tattoo) and is fluent in te reo.

On 9 November 2014, Peters made her debut for New Zealand in their 12–8 win over Australia, playing alongside her sisters Rona and Kahurangi.

In November 2017, she was a member of New Zealand's 2017 Women's Rugby League World Cup squad. On 2 December 2017, she started at second-row in New Zealand's final loss to Australia.

On 31 July 2018, she was named in the inaugural New Zealand Warriors NRL Women's Premiership squad. In Round 1 of the 2018 NRL Women's season, she made her debut for the Warriors, starting on the wing and scoring a try in a 10–4 win over the Sydney Roosters. Her try was the first ever try scored in the NRL Women's Premiership.

On 15 February 2019, she started on the wing for the Māori All Stars in their 8–4 win over the Indigenous All Stars.

In September 2020, Hale was one of five New Zealand-based Warriors' players to travel to Australia to play in the 2020 NRL Women's premiership. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, the players had to quarantine for 14 days on entering Australia and 14 days on return to New Zealand when the season was completed.

Political career
In September 2022, Hilda Peters announced that she would be standing for a position for the Manurewa Local Board in the 2022 Auckland local board elections, as part of the Manurewa Action Team ticket. Peters was unsuccessful, polling 3,425 votes and placing eighteenth in a field of twenty-nine candidates.

Peters contested the Māngere electorate during the 2023 New Zealand general election as a Te Pāti Māori candidate, and was also placed at 11 on Te Pāti Māori's party list. She came fourth place in Mangare, with 934 votes.

Hilda Mariu

Hilda Peters (born 9 August 1983) is a New Zealand rugby league footballer who plays for the New Zealand Warriors in the NRL Women's Premiership. Primarily a winger, she is a New Zealand representative. Born in Auckland, Peters began playing rugby...

nzwarriors.com

 

[mt.wellington]

League: Hilda Mariu at centre of history​

By Michael Burgess
26 Aug, 2018


Warriors Women's centre Hilda Mariu is the ultimate late bloomer.

She didn't play league until the age of 19 and her initial forays into the sport were strictly social. But Mariu has since represented her country, played at a World Cup and won domestic titles. Now she's part of the first female Warriors side, with the NRL Women's premiership kicking off in early September.

"It's all starting to sink in now," said Mariu. "It's like, wow, this is really happening. It's history in the making and I get to be a part of this. Hopefully we are paving the way for the young ones coming through."

Mariu is in Sydney for media and photo opportunities this weekend with players from the other teams (Broncos, Dragons and Roosters).

To make the competition even more special, Mariu will be playing alongside younger sister Kahurangi Peters, while another sibling, Rona Peters, is in the Broncos squad.

"It gives me goose bumps. I'm very proud to be playing with one sister and against another sister. It's the pinnacle, knowing that history will be made and it's amazing to have my family involved."

Although she came from a league family, there weren't many options when Mariu was growing up in the early 1990s.

"There wasn't much league," said Mariu. "There was mainly netball around, so Mum made me play netball. Later, my sisters started playing [league] when my Mum and Dad were coaches.

"Finally, when I was 19, I thought I'll give it a go, and after that, I was definitely hooked. But my sisters were lucky because they started playing when they were little."

Mariu made more history after receiving her moko kauae last weekend.

"To be honest, it was something I wanted to do for me, so I didn't even think about the whole first time thing.

"I was brought up in a Māori world," said Mariu, who is fluent in Te Reo, like her sisters. "With the moko, I've always seen it around. Growing up, you do kapa haka and they draw the moko on your face ... I've always known it to be a part of who I am."

"This year, I thought I'm ready to get my moko.

"It's part of my whakapapa, or my genealogy, and it's an acknowledgement of who I truly am."

Mariu said the hour-long procedure wasn't as physically challenging as she expected.

"It wasn't painful at all," said Mariu. "It would probably hurt a lot more getting smashed in a game of league."

Hilda Mariu at centre of history

It's a family affair for Hilda Mariu and her two sisters in the NRL women's premiership.

www.nzherald.co.nz

 

[mt.wellington]

Warriors' Hilda Mariu set to become first NRL star to play with moko kauae​

August 22, 2018


'She looks beautiful' - Warriors’ Hilda Mariu set to become first NRL star to play with facial moko

It's a big moment in the Mariu family, with Hilda's partner Laura also named to captain the women's Warriors team.

'She looks beautiful' - Warriors’ Hilda Mariu set to become first NRL star to play with facial moko1:26
It's a big moment in the Mariu family, with Hilda's partner Laura also named to captain the women's Warriors team. (Source: Other)

The Warriors women's team is continuing their build up towards their first match in the inaugural premiership where they’ll also celebrate another first in the sport.

Second rower Hilda Mariu will become the first professional female athlete to adorn a moko kauae or traditional Māori chin tattoo.

The 35-year-old received the gift back home in Te Kao, Northland over the weekend.

Mariu's new look is being embraced by the team and her wife Laura – who is also playing in the team.

"It was very special moment for us," Laura said.

"I don’t know much about moko kauae but it’s an expression of her culture and who she is as a person and a strong Māori woman.
"She looks beautiful, absolutely beautiful."

The Warriors' first game is set for September 8 with the premiership running alongside the NRL Finals series.

 

[mt.wellington]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGAInRAVviM​

 

[mt.wellington]

Former league star throws hat in the ring for local board​

Saturday, September 3, 2022 • By Tumamao Harawira


From the rugby league field to community activator, to local politics. For Hilda Peters, it's always been about whānau.

"Our whānau are reaching out to us, they want to change and it's about time. If I can help in any way to make that change, anei ahau, here I am."

Former Māori All Stars, Kiwi Ferns, and New Zealand Warriors representative Hilda Peters has swapped her rugby league boots for local politics, putting her hat in the ring for the Manurewa Local Board.

Peters has been instrumental in Manurewa Marae's Covid-19 response and now will look to use all her experience for the betterment of the Manurewa community.

Peters comes from a rugby league dynasty that started with her father and trickled down to her siblings.

"I've got a whole whānau that play rugby league. My dad used to play rugby league for Manurewa, I think they were called Southern United back in the day, and then we went out to Papakura. I have three other sisters that I grew up playing rugby league along with my brother. He was a Junior Kiwi."

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She has been at the forefront of the Covid effort in Manurewa, leading the Covid rollout. Now she has turned her sights to creating widespread change in her community, via the Manurewa Local Board, and her Manurewa Action Team.

"Here at the marae, we have vaccinated over 60,000 whānau. So, coming through this marae and meeting whānau, talking to whānau, you then get a really good idea as to what struggles our whānau have been going through over the last two years."

Peters says the issues she will be campaigning on relate to whānau and the struggles that she has seen firsthand.

"It's living costs. It's whānau not being able to provide like they used to. It's kai. It's petrol. It's our day-to-day things that were always just something we did but, now, we are just struggling."

Former league star throws hat in the ring for local board

www.teaonews.co.nz

 

[mt.wellington]

Peters family embrace emotional reunion and latest honour​

Corey Rosser Mon 25 Jul 2022, 02:01 pm


Few siblings have achieved more in New Zealand rugby league than the Peters sisters, and this month they celebrated having a new competition named in their honour with a special on-field reunion in Queensland.

Having last played together in 2019 as members of the Māori women’s side at the Harvey Norman NRL All Stars, Hilda, Rona and Kahurangi Peters took the field for Queensland’s Runaway Bay club on July 9, with the bonus of having their 18-year-old niece Atlanta with them in the team as well.

It added to an already special month for the family, after finding out the Peters Sisters Competition – which has grades for senior women and U-16 girls – was being formed in their home region of Northland, New Zealand.

Hilda, who was a member of the inaugural Warriors NRLW squad, said what had originally been planned as a holiday quickly became an opportunity to get the band back together at Runaway Bay, where younger sister and Titans player Rona is the captain/coach of the women’s team.

“I hadn’t seen my family in Australia in three years and Rona, being the very smart one she is, sent over an international transfer for me a month before my trip,” Hilda told NRL.com.



“I hadn’t played with my sisters since 2019, so it had been a while and I knew I wanted to play with my sisters again.

“We ran onto the field and I looked around and I could hear my sister’s voice saying ‘yeah, I got you’.

It kind of just brought this immense pride back, it’s a spiritual thing, you just know your sister is there and she has your back.
Hilda Peters

“There was my two sisters and my niece playing that day and it was just a beautiful feeling.

“I am so proud of Atlanta. Being in New Zealand I have only been able to watch her via live streaming, so to not only see her play, but play alongside her was such a highlight.

“She’s definitely like her aunties in terms of defence and she gets in there, but on attack she’s got wheels and I feel like she might have got that from the other side of the family!”

For Atlanta, who this year made her debut for Tweed in Queensland’s BMD Premiership and was in the wider Queensland U-19 squad, it was the chance to fulfill a goal she set back in 2019 when she was in the crowd for the All Stars match.

“That was the moment I realised it one of my goals and dreams to play with my aunties, at any level, and for them to be around me on the field meant the world to me,” Atlanta told NRL.com.

“I felt so safe with them on the field and it was a buzz.

“And now they have a competition named after them! Man, that’s cool, they are such big role models for everyone back home and it’s so cool they have that.”



Hilda meanwhile hopes the formation of the Peters Sisters Competition can inspire more women to get involved in rugby league in the region, which in the early years of the Kiwi Ferns supplied plenty of national players, but in more recent times has struggled.

“I have nieces, cousins and aunties up there with talent, but we never see it because there’s been no consistent competitions for females,” Hilda said.
“But I do think it’s a sleeping giant… there’s going to be some massive talent that comes out of that place.

“It means so much to us to have the competition carrying our name, and because we are from that area it’s not just a whānau thing, it’s a tribal thing, and it’s for everyone.”

Peters family embrace emotional reunion and latest honour

Few siblings have achieved more in New Zealand rugby league than the Peters sisters, and this month they celebrated having a new competition named in their honour with a special on-field reunion in Queensland.

www.nrl.com