Canterbury ladies team were photographed doing the dance for a charity calendar - donating money to Breast Cancer Care for each edition sold.

It was not a serious interpretation, as player Rebecca Willis explained.

"We didn't really know what we were doing so it was kind of the jump with a lot of noise," she said.

"We did it lots of times to get the picture right and luckily we had the field to ourselves. We never really thought it would offend people.

"At first we just thought we would sell the calendars to friends and family."

Teammate Jo Gleeson, herself a New Zealander, did not appear in the Haka photo but appears in others.

"I've never played in New Zealand and I think they take it a bit more seriously over there," she said. "I certainly don't think they'd be doing the haka topless."

Alexa Kent, the team's lock and also a photographer by trade, who took the photos for the calendar, came up with the idea.

"I just wanted a muddy shot with a rugby tie-in and the haka seemed the obvious choice," she said.

The team did not learn the chant of the actions as such, instead only watching videos of the All Blacks doing the dance. But Maori academics have labelled their interpretation of the All Blacks' Ka Mate haka as racially ignorant.

"It looks like misuse of the haka to me," said Dr Poia Rewi, senior lecturer in the School of Maori Studies at Otago University.

"I think Maori would be offended by this," he said.

"Women traditionally did do the haka, and if they really wanted to vent their spleen they might have been prompted to expose their private parts.

"But that's the ultimate expression of soul feeling. If Maori aren't doing it now then I think other people who the culture doesn't belong to should be a bit cautious.

"It's not something I would promote."