Shearing Sports New Zealand hopes to resume annual home and away transtasman test matches this year.

President Sir David Fagan said that with borders reopening after the two-year Covid-19 disruption, New Zealand has been asked to send a team to Bendigo, Vic, in October during the Australian National Championships of mowing and wool.

It is hoped that the Australian side will then return the favor for the return matches at Masterton’s Golden Shears in March.

The last matches between New Zealand and Australia were at the Golden Shears in 2020, a fortnight before the first pandemic lockdown, when New Zealand won the shearing and wool handling tests and completed a sweep of the 2019-20 season following a Blades Shear win at Waimate in October 2019 – the first sweep either side since 2014.

Sir David described the possibility of the series being relaunched in Bendigo as ‘looking quite likely’ but decisions will be made at the SSNZ National Committee meeting in Christchurch on August 15-16, when the committee will also decide on processes selection of New Zealand. team for the 2023 World Championships at the Royal Highland Show in Scotland next June.

If the decision is to go to Bendigo, the meeting will have to decide on the composition of the team, the usual selection process having also been disrupted by the pandemic, which has led to dozens of cancellations of competitions, including the neo championships. – merino zeelanders 2021 to Alexandra and the golden shears in 2021 and 2022.

The machine shearing team traditionally includes the winners of the Golden Shears Open, the National Shearing Tour and the New Zealand Merino Championship, with the woolhandlers being the winners of the North Island Tour and the New Zealand Merino Championship. Zealand, and the bladershearing winners at the Waimate Spring Shears and Golden Blades of the Canterbury show.

The annual transtasman series began in the 1974–75 season, alternating between a new Golden Shears of Australia at Euroa, Vic, and the Golden Shears at Masterton, with two Tests each season until 1984 when the competition was suspended due to a boycott by the Australian Union of Workers.

It was revived in Perth in 1997, since then the Australian stages have been held primarily in conjunction with the Australian Championships and held in rotation by Australian states.

Wool handling tests were added in 1998 and blade shear tests, with New Zealand leg matches in Christchurch or Waimate, were added in 2010.

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