The Super Netball finals kick off this weekend. Who will take out the 2023 premiership? Players, coaches and experts have revealed their tips.
The Super Netball finals are on our doorstep.
Who will be crowned as 2023 champions?
Coaches, star players and our experts reveal their tips.
SUPER NETBALL FINALS PREDICTIONS
Geva Mentor (Collingwood co-captain)
Winners: NSW Swifts
The Swifts have not only found form, they are a team that can offer so much variety, they’re consistent and certain individuals are having the season of their lives. And last but not least, they know how to win and grind out those tough and close games.
Jamie-Lee Price (Giants vice-captain)
Winners: NSW Swifts
I feel like they have been consistent this whole year and have shown plenty of glimpses (of composure) throughout to win in the dying minutes of the game! They also have so much experience in each third of the court that have played in big moments and plenty of finals for years now, so I think those leaders will step up.
Kim Ravaillion (Queensland Firebirds captain)
Winners: Adelaide Thunderbirds
If Adelaide can beat the Swifts this weekend and go straight through to the grand final and then face the Swifts again in the grand final the Thunderbirds will win.
Belinda Reynolds (Sunshine Coast Lighting coach)
Winners: NSW Swifts
They have been the most consistent this year. I think it will come down to the super shot and the Swifts have such threatening shooters in that two point period. Helen Housby is in incredible form this year and she has the ability to be threatening with the one point and two point shots as well.
Lisa Alexander (Former Diamonds Coach)
Winners: NSW Swifts
The Swifts have the most versatile team and therefore can cope with most of what the opposition throws at them. The Achilles heel is Adelaide Thunderbirds! Perhaps it is the Jamaican (Romelda Aiken-George) v Jamaican (Shamera Sterling) in the Swifts’ goaling end that will be a deciding factor? Any case, the Swifts will have the mindset that we can reset against the T-Birds and find a way to unpick them.
Emma Greenwood (Code Sports expert)
Winners: NSW Swifts
NSW Swifts The recruitment of Romelda Aiken has been a master stroke for the Swifts who have all the elements needed to become the first club to win three Super Netball titles. With Helen Housby having a near MVP season, goalkeeper Sarah Klau defusing opposition attacks and the experience of co-captains Maddy Proud and Paige Hadley in the midcourt, the Swifts can go all the way.
Erin Smith (Code Sports expert)
Winners: Adelaide Thunderbirds
They might not have any finals experience but they have waited so long for this opportunity I don’t think they will squander it. Thunderbirds have been in great form and beat the Swifts just last weekend. Their imports Eleanor Cardwell, Shamera Sterling and Latanya Wilson all have experience playing big games which will be key this finals campaign. Thunderbirds underdog status coupled with finals fever could easily see them lift the trophy this year.
Biggest disappointment the making of Price
— Emma Greenwood
The single toughest moment of Jamie-Lee Price’s career was responsible for turning her into a netballer the Diamonds could not overlook for the World Cup.
Price was named this week in Australia’s team for the World Cup almost exactly a year after being left out of the side for the Commonwealth Games.
It was a shattering experience for the midcourter, who as a Diamonds reserve, helped the Aussies prepare for their gold medal-winning campaign in Birmingham, all the while knowing she would not be part of the experience.
“The disappointment with Comm Games, I guess in hindsight whilst it was really heartbreaking, it was a massive eye-opener for me,” Price said.
“It was a time where I reflected on the level that I could rise to and I felt like I hadn’t really reached the capability that I have been able to (now).
“As much as it really hurt, it was good for me to look within myself.”
Price realises that might sound “cringe”.
But in sounding out her greatest ally – dad Steve, a former rugby league international and State of Origin great – Price realised she had to go to find another level if she was to extend her international career.
“I knew that I had to put my best foot forward and just go out there and play the way that I play,” she said.
Outstanding performances in the Constellation Cup and series against England were followed by an off-season of grind as Price left no stone unturned in her mission to return to the Diamonds’ 12.
But the biggest change has been regaining her self belief.
“I had so many chats with dad and I feel like he’s been in those positions many a time,” Price said.
“It’s almost like a frustration because you know that you’re good enough to be there. But then when you don’t make it you’re like, ‘why, why’?”
But Price senior knew it could be just what his daughter needed to finally believe in herself.
“(He said) you need to realise that you’re good enough and what you bring to the team is something that no one else can do, so the sooner that you start realising your capabilities and believing in yourself, then the sooner you’ll start performing and rise to that next level,” Price said.
“The massive thing for me has just been that bit of self belief.”
That belief was tested last week though when the team announcement was delayed as Netball Australia used selection as a bargaining chip in drawn-out Collective Player Agreement negotiations.
With NA refusing to name the team on a previously agreed date, players were left in limbo and Price did not realise the toll it had taken until she burst into tears while speaking to young players.
“I don’t think I realised how stressed I was,” Price said.
“Throughout the whole season I was very calm, cool and collected because I was like, all I need to do is play well for my club and the rest will happen.
“But when we were all so set on a date and it’s finally just around the corner and then you’re told: ‘we’re not going to announce the team’ … I went to the Bankstown Association to talk to some teams about the state titles and my journey and I would never do this but I literally bawled my eyes out.
“I think it just all hit me in front of these young girls.”
The stalemate was finally broken when NA and the Australian Netball Players Association agreed to extend their interim agreement until the end of August, allowing Price to feel “a mix of all the emotions” when Marinkovich rang to deliver the good news.