Have our coaches missed the bus?
The paucity of Kiwi coaches capable of taking on the Silver Ferns top job is a sad indictment on the sport. Outside Noeline Taurua, who is coaching the Sunshine Coast Lightning in Australia, homegrown contenders are scarcer than Silver Fern wins over the past 10 months.
Wai Taumaunu and Yvonne Willering have been there and done that with the national team and both shape as caretaker possibilities should the Ferns have to wait on their next coach.
If Steve Hansen suddenly stepped aside as All Blacks coach, several New Zealand-based names could assume the mantle without even having to look at the plethora of Kiwi coaching exports offshore.
All Blacks assistant Ian Foster or Scott Robertson, who has carved out a stellar record in his two years with the Crusaders, could fill the void. Chiefs coach Colin Cooper, who previously enjoyed success with the Ma¯ ori All Blacks, Hurricanes, and Taranaki, would also have the respect and experience required.
Where are those people in New Zealand netball?
Should Taurua not want the Silver Ferns job, or a deal not able to be struck, Netball New Zealand will likely have to turn to Australia, highlighting its plight.
Several of the national premiership coaches have shown promise and might one day be involved with the Silver Ferns coaching set-up. They’d be the first to admit they’re a long way off being ready right now. Inserting them into the vacant head coaching role would be akin to tossing them to the lions.
NNZ hasn’t done itself any favours, clogging its coaching pathways.
In the final years of the former trans-Tasman competition, two of the five domestic head coaching positions were filled by Australians. Julie Fitzgerald, who missed out to Janine Southby for the Ferns’ job in 2015, was in charge at the Waikato-Bay of Plenty Magic and Sue Hawkins was with the Mainland Tactix.
Some of the emerging coaching talent became disenchanted with the lack of opportunities and headed overseas to further their careers.
Kiwi netball coaches overseas include Gail Parata (Scotland head coach) and Natalie Milicich (Singapore head coach). Te Aroha Keenan was involved at Team Northumbria in England, while Tania Hoffman had a stint as Surrey Storm’s director of netball.
The lack of former Silver Ferns remaining in the sport and moving into coaching has been a worry.
That is slowly beginning to improve. Former Ferns, Sandra Edge (Pulse assistant), Temepara Bailey (Stars assistant), Margaret Forsyth (Magic coach) and Julie Seymour (Tactix assistant) are coaching national premiership sides. Fellow ex-internationals Linda Vagana and Sonya Hardcastle joined the Mystics this year as specialist coaches.
The greatest shooter in Silver Ferns’ history, Irene van Dyk, has been influential in the development of the Pulse teen shooting duo of Aliyah Dunn and Tiana Metuarau, Taumaunu’s 17-year-old daughter, this season. Donna Wilkins deserves credit for goal shoot Jennifer O’Connell’s rise at the Steel.
Van Dyk was assistant coach of the Wellington Black A side, who took out the national under-17 title last week. Another former Ferns shooter Jodi Brown was coaching Dunedin at the same tournament.
Former Silver Ferns wing defence Joline Henry is establishing her coaching career in Hong Kong.
NNZ has trumpeted the fact the second-tier Beko League will go some way to addressing its coaching problems. The six-team competition has created 12 positions (head and assistant coaches) for the next wave of coaches coming through.
NNZ must do more to educate, develop, and inspire those coaches.
Last year, many of the country’s leading netball minds, including Taumaunu, Taurua, Willering, Edge, Ruth Aitken, Leigh Gibbs, Lyn Gunson, and Dame Lois Muir, tackled the big coaching questions at a high performance forum.
All the premiership, Beko, national programme coaches and zone high performance managers also attended.
It was the first time such a gathering had been held in many years and illustrated how much elite coaching has been neglected.
NNZ must ensure those doyens of the game are working with the national premiership and Beko coaches on a greater basis. A couple of meetings during the season simply isn’t enough.
Premiership coaches, Forsyth, Kiri Wills (Stars), Marianne Delaney-Hoshek (Tactix), Helene Wilson (Mystics) and Debbie Fuller, now a performance manager for Netball Waikato-BOP, are all doing High Performance Sport New Zealand’s (HPSNZ) coach accelerator programme.
Getting all the premiership and Beko coaches together in the same room for regular workshops would be another positive move.
High performance coaching will be addressed in the second part of the review, which explores the wider issues in New Zealand netball. It could make for ugly reading.
Some of the emerging coaching talent became disenchanted with the lack of opportunities and headed overseas to further their careers.