A convincing ground was the name or journalistic euphemism for a place where sports were contested, having limited currency in the nineteenth century, predominantly in Australia and New Zealand.
It has been used to describe a boxing arena in Australia[1], a social sports ground in 1891 [2], a cricket ground in New Zealand in 1862 [3] and a trotting track in New Zealand in 1904 [4].
Two placenames in Australia retain the name; Convincing Ground Road at Karangi, New South Wales and the Convincing Ground, a flat coastal area at Allestree near Portland, Victoria where a massacre of Aborigines by whalers has been suggested by some historians based in part on an apparent misinterpretation of the meaning of convincing ground.