THE netballing nest at Kenny Park feels like it’s extending slightly further.
Merbein A Grade coach Breigh Hammet admitted in past years it was likely that 90 per cent of the club’s A and B Grade teams could have been named before trials were held.
That’s not the case in 2023.
The much-loved mentor said as many as 20 netballers are pushing for selection in the top two divisions, creating a very welcome selectors’ conundrum.
A combination of junior players stepping up to seniors, players in lower grades pushing their case and new recruits to the Magpies means competition for places is expected to be fierce.
Among the ‘newbies’ to wear the black and white are attacker Maddie Alvino, a former Mildura junior who returns to the region from Bendigo, and versatile tall Sophie Kroehn, who played GK for Imperials in 2022.
“We’re getting to where we want to be as a club,” Hammet said.
“The pre-season group we’re running has 53 players and we’ve been averaging about 25 each session.
“Especially for us, often in the past we’ve reached the opening rounds of the season and have wondered if we’ll have the numbers to cover all grades but I don’t think we’ll have that issue this year.
“To be honest, if you had asked me in the past about A and B Grade squads, I probably could have named 90 per cent of the players before we’d even held trials.
“This year we’ve got up to 20 girls who are pushing for A and B which is a really good problem to have. A number of our B Graders last year played so well that they’ve put themselves up for A Grade selection.”
Ava Smith and Emma Martin both got a taste of senior netball in 2022, while Olivia Bowden and Shelby Hooker have also been nominated as players pushing for higher honours.
One player whose future is slightly more unclear is Hammet herself. The defender suffered a horrific compound fracture in her ankle in August from an awkward landing which subsequently caused the match with Imperials to be abandoned.
The Victoria Police senior sergeant is back training with the the playing group but would be happy to purely coach from the sidelines as well.
“I’ll never be where I was before the injury but if I can get back to some kind of fitness I’ll take it,” she said.
“If we have the numbers I won’t play this year and I’ll just coach from the sidelines. Sometimes it’s good having that different perspective and ability to pass on messages.
“If I didn’t play a great game I felt at times it made it hard to coach others so sometimes seeing where we need to take things from the sidelines can help.”
Merbein finished the season with four wins, 10 losses and a draw, alongside the abandoned game, however four of those defeats came by five goals or less.
Hammet believes faster transition into attack could help reverse those those results.
“Our defence has always been pretty good, it’s probably just in attack that we’ve needed to solidify a bit and get the speed of our ball movement going forward,” she said.
“In four game last year we lost by about five goals so if we can just get that movement down the court happening a bit faster I think it will help us.”
A lack of fitness won’t be an issue either with the team combining netball centric skills sessions with a number programs completed at group fitness gyms around town, including Thrive Wellness, Air Locker Training and BFT.
“We’ve also been really well supported by some of the gyms around town,” Hammet said.
“I don’t think pre-season would work as well if it was just me up the front barking orders … it makes such a difference to change things up and I don’t think you only want to be throwing a ball about.”
Merbein initially had the Round 1 bye but with amendments made to the draw this week they open their campaign against Ouyen United at Underbool.
