Women’s Inter-District cricket in Central Districts will have a new look about it this season as structural changes sees two cherished pieces of silverware go on the line in brand new roles.

The Mike Shrimpton Trophy — contested in previous seasons either solely or predominantly as a one-day prize, now becomes the premier women’s T20 competition silverware within CD. 

It will go on the line for a three-day round robin tournament in Levin from Friday 19 to Sunday 21 December 2025 this season, with Nelson and Marlborough entering as a combined team.

 

Meanwhile the Copelin Cup, which previously went on the line as a challenge trophy (often contemporaneously at one-day Mike Shrimpton Trophy games), now becomes the one-day trophy, to be contested by four of CD’s North Island-based Districts this summer: Taranaki, Wairarapa, Hawke’s Bay and Manawatū.

Each team will play six rounds across 2025/26, the Copelin Cup season beginning on 9 November with matches in Hāwera and Hawke’s Bay. 

After considerable growth over the past decade, Nelson and Marlborough will continue to play against each other regionally in regular one-day fixtures in the top of the South, while Whanganui and Horowhenua-Kāpiti continue to develop their women’s participation programmes at District level.

 

Wairarapa (above) emerged as both the (one-day) Mike Shrimpton Trophy and CD T20 champion last summer, dominating both formats, and will host the final match of the realigned Copelin Cup in Masterton on 15 March 2026.

Central Districts Cricket Association’s Female Performance and Pathways lead Jamie Watkins said the realignment of the trophies was made in consultation with the District Associations over the winter.

The redesign provides performance opportunities in a practical framework — with the hope that more Districts will be in a position to join in future.

The Mike Shrimpton Trophy T20s gives Districts players opportunities to shine ahead of the annual Super Smash window, national U17 and U19 women’s tournaments, and CD A fixtures later in the summer, while the reconfigured Copelin Cup will run parallel to Nelson and Marlborough’s established inter-District fixtures.

 

The trophies respectively honour the late Mike Shrimpton - a BLACKCAPS Test rep, Central Stags captain and NZC Bert Sutcliffe Medial recipient who coached the Central Hinds and WHITE FERNS; and the late Stan Copelin, a distinguished first-class umpire from Taranaki who umpired both men’s and women’s Domestic cricket, as well as women’s international cricket in New Zealand.

Copelin donated the distinctive wooden trophy before he passed away in New Plymouth in 2009, while the Mike Shrimpton Trophy is physically the largest interdistrict trophy in New Zealand.

It comprises of the framed, team-autographed WHITE FERNS bat that was presented to Shrimpton after he had coached them to New Zealand’s first World Cup cricket title, in 2000.

The new-look Mike Shrimpton Trophy tournament in Levin will be played as a round robin running simultaneously to the CD men’s inter-District Chapple Cup in Palmerston North, just before Christmas.

In recent years, CDCA has trialled or provided different structures to keep up with the growth and increasing depth of the female game at District rep and pathway level. 

Two seasons of the Central Super League (a four-team, T20 franchise-style competition sponsored by John Turkington Forestry that featured players drafted from throughout the region) ran from 2020 to 2022. 

Last season saw a hybrid one-day and T20 model that provided separate competitions, but also, points awarded in Nelson’s T20 fixtures that counted towards the Mike Shrimpton Trophy table. 

“The nature of CD is that we are a huge region, and the only one in New Zealand that encompasses District Associations on both the main islands,” said Watkins.

“That brings unique logistical challenges for us in our competition design."

 

 

He said it was a good problem to have, as it’s been exciting to see women’s pathway and representative growing at all levels over the last decade.

“That’s a reflection of some really good work and strategy that’s gone into growing the grassroots of the female game right across New Zealand.

“NZC is now introducing a formal NZC national women’s under 17 tournament for the first time this season, to align with their male under 17 tournament, and that’s an outcome of that growth and the pathways that Major Associations have developed to support it.

"Over the past few seasons, CDCA has worked alongside our District Associations every step of the way to be adaptable and provide workable, responsive programmes as the depth has grown."

Watkins is looking forward to seeing the women’s pathway evolve further "and along with our Districts, we’re very much looking forward to seeing the first editions of the new-format Mike Shrimpton Trophy and Copelin Cup competitions this summer.”

 

TWO TREASURED TROPHIES

 

 

Wairarapa Cricket Association will head into the new season as holder not only of the (previous format) Mike Shrimpton Trophy, but of the CD inter-District men’s white-ball Chapple Cup that the District won for the first time last season, in a tournament that began in 1977.

Taranaki is looking to defend the Furlong Cup, the CDCA competition among its six North Island Districts that determines the right to challenge for the Hawke Cup on behalf of Hawke Cup Zone 2. 

As the current holder of the Hawke Cup — having taken it off Hawke’s Bay, followed by three successful defences last summer, if Taranaki wins the 2025/26 Furlong Cup competition, the second-placed District will join them in the first Hawke Cup Challenge Match of 2026 at Pukekura Park from 30 January to 1 February.

Nelson and Marlborough meanwhile head into the Zone 3 Hawke Cup competition as usual, alongside Canterbury districts Canterbury Country (based in Rangiora) and Buller (Westport).

The winner of the Zone 3 Final will get to make the Zone 3 Challenge at the end of February, against whichever District has the Hawke Cup in their possession at the time.

All CDCA tournaments and competitions will be scheduled and livescored on CD PlayHQ.

2025/26 SCHEDULES

Mike Shrimpton Trophy

(women’s inter-District T20)

19-21 December 2025

Donnelly Park, Levin

Draw coming soon.

Further information 

Copelin Cup

(women’s CD North Island inter-District one-day)

Sunday 9 November 2025

Taranaki v Manawatū in Hāwera

Hawke’s Bay v Wairarapa in Hawke’s Bay  

Saturday 22 November 2025

Hawke’s Bay v Taranaki in Hawke’s Bay

Sunday 23 November 2025

Manawatū v Wairarapa in Palmerston North 

Hawke’s Bay v Taranaki in Hawke’s Bay

Sunday 30 November 2025

Wairarapa v Manawatū in Masterton 

Sunday 14 December 2025 

Hawke’s Bay v Manawatū in Hawke’s Bay

Sunday 25 January 2026

Taranaki v Wairarapa in New Plymouth 

Manawatū v Hawke’s Bay in Palmerston North 

Sunday 8 February 2026

Wairarapa v Hawke’s Bay in Masterton 

Manawatū v Taranaki in Marton  

Sunday 15 February 2026

Wairarapa v Taranaki in Masterton

Furlong Cup

(men’s Zone 2 inter-District, weekend two-day fixtures)

22-23 November 2025 

Whanganui v Taranaki in Whanganui

29-30 November 2025

Taranaki v Wairarapa in New Plymouth

Whanganui v Horowhenua-Kāpiti in Whanganui

6-7 December 2025

Horowhenua-Kāpiti v Hawke’s Bay in Levin

Manawatū v Whanganui in Feilding (Kowhai Park)

13-14 December 2025

Taranaki v Horowhenua-Kāpiti in New Plymouth                         

Hawke’s Bay v Manawatū in Napier 

Wairarapa v Whanganui in Masterton                  

10-11 January 2026

Whanganui v Hawke’s Bay in Whanganui                    

Manawatū v Taranaki in Palmerston North

Horowhenua-Kāpiti v Wairarapa in Kāpiti 

17-18 January 2026

Wairarapa v Manawatū in Masterton

Hawke’s Bay v Taranaki in Napier                              

24-25 January 2026

Manawatū v Horowhenua-Kāpiti in Palmerston North             

Wairarapa v Hawke’s Bay in Masterton     

Zone 3 Hawke Cup

6-7 December 2025

Buller v Canterbury Country in Westport 

13-14 December 2025

Nelson v Marlborough in Nelson

10-11 January 2026

Nelson v Buller in Nelson

Marlborough v Canterbury Country in Blenheim

24-25 January 2026

Buller v Marlborough in Westport

Canterbury Country v Nelson in Rangiora    

• Top two teams progress to 3-day Zone 3 Final

Hawke Cup Challenge Matches

Zone 2 Challenge

Friday 30 Jan-Sunday 1 February 2026

Taranaki v Furlong Cup qualifier)

At Pukekura Park, New Plymouth

Zone 1 Challenge

Friday 13-Sunday 15 February 2026

Holder v Zone 1 Challenger TBC

At Holder’s home ground

Zone 3 Challenge

Friday 27 February-Sunday 1 March 2026

Holder v Zone 3 Challenger TBC

At Holder’s home ground

Zone 4 Challenge

Friday 13-Sunday 15 March 2026

Holder v Zone 4 Challenger TBC

At Holder’s home ground

CDCA Age-Group

Annual tournaments and festivals

7-9 December 2025 

Year 11-13 Girls

Whanganui

8-11 December 2025 

Year 11-12 Boys

Napier

16-18 December 2025

Year 9-10 Girls

Palmerston North

12-14 January 2026 

Year 7-8 Girls

Masterton

12-15 January 2026 

Year 10 Boys

Levin

Article added: Thursday 11 September 2025