『Kerre Woodham: Netball's struggle to attract eyes』のカバーアート

Kerre Woodham: Netball's struggle to attract eyes

Kerre Woodham: Netball's struggle to attract eyes

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Now if you were to wander down to your local netball court on any given Saturday morning in winter, you would see hundreds, no matter how small the town might be, you would see hundreds, and in the biggest cities, thousands of parents and young women on the courts, on the sidelines, waiting in the queue for a park in the car park, checking to see if they're blocking a bit of your driveway as they try and desperately find a park down a side street to get to the game on time. It is our national women's game – netball's played by nearly 30,000 secondary school students and more than 60,000 juniors in New Zealand. It's the most popular participant secondary school sport for girls in New Zealand and has been for years and years and years. Moms who played netball come down to watch daughters, and sons up until secondary school, playing netball. Dads who watched the moms play netball back in the day when they were just courting are now watching daughters on the sidelines. Huge supporters. But why does that support, that love of the game, that passion for the game – because on some of those wet, cold, icy mornings, it's a lot to get up out of your warm bed and head down to the courts. All very well and good to be playing, but when you're standing shivering on the sideline, that's commitment. So why does that support, that passion and commitment not translate into being able to sustain a money-making professional league for our very, very best players? The annus horribilis of Netball New Zealand, or really, it's an anni horribiles, have been well traversed. But one of the main problems that Netball New Zealand encountered was that there just weren't enough people watching the game to support televising the league, and without high rating broadcasts, it's really hard to secure sponsorship and a long-term future for the league. Netball New Zealand will argue that viewer numbers were improving. The average live television audience for an ANZ Premiership fixture was 51,800 – a 32% increase on 2025, which means that in 2025 they were miserable numbers. But then compare that to the hundreds and thousands who watch rugby on the telly for the Super Rugby matches. The ranks of our best netballers have been gutted as Netball New Zealand worked to find a way to continue with some form of a premier competition. They just couldn't get it nailed down quickly enough, so 13 of our elite players have headed across the Tasman to play, they've been snapped up. Five are heading to the UK's Netball Superleague. If people weren't watching a competition with our very best netballers, some of the best netballers in the world, will we watch with only the up and comers? Chief executive of Netball New Zealand Jennah Wootten is confident we have the talent for a new competition. "I've been talking to a lot of former Silver Ferns and a lot of people that are deeply involved in the technical side of our sport. And I think one of the things I'm hearing from a lot of them, Mike, is yes, 18 players have signed to go offshore and we totally respect and understand why, we couldn't give them certainty early enough. But if you look at the ANZ Premiership this year, we had around 60 players in that competition. So there's actually an enormous amount that are still here. And what I'm really excited about is seeing what new talent's going to come through. You know, there'll be a whole lot of people that have been on the cusp of getting into these teams in the past. This is going to be their moment, and I reckon we're going to learn a whole lot of new names in netball that are going to be the stars of the future." Well, you hope so. And that's certainly what angel investors Anna Mowbray and Ali Williams are hoping, who are the backers of a private domestic competition as of next year. They know about sport, they know about business, they know how to get people along, they know how to drum up passion for a team, and hopefully they can do the same for this tournament. Mowbray and Williams will determine the competition format, the team structure and the season dates. And Jennah Wootten said having them come to the rescue gives the netball community clarity on the direction of travel after a lengthy period of uncertainty. But what is it that makes a sport watchable? There is no doubt that there are hundreds of thousands of people involved in netball in this country who take an interest. And they put their money where their mouth is, they travel, they get up on a Saturday morning, they take the kids to the practices, they travel from city to city too, if the kids get into the top leagues to watch the inter-sport competition. They play social netball. There's a lot of interest in the game that does not translate to eyes on screens. Why? I'll watch a sport I've never played and really enjoy it. Love watching the league, love watching the union, never played it. Really enjoy it. Love watching tennis. You'd argue that netball's more ...
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