England’s golden girls near another chance to shine

SERENA GUTHRIE has warned that the days of England being the ‘nearly’ team of netball are over.

As focus shifts from

Phil Neville’s Lionesses to the Roses side coached by sister Tracey, Guthrie says England are ready to “put right”

44 years of frustration and reach a World Cup final. “We can’t sit here now and say we’re not confident,” said Guthrie ahead of the tournament, which starts in Liverpool on Friday. “Success breeds confidence.”

That success came last year when Helen Housby netted a last-gasp winner to beat Australia for gold at the Commonwealth

Games, inspiring 130,000 people in England to take up the sport.

But before that golden moment on the Gold Coast, England had not reached a global netball final since 1975, with the ‘curse of the bronze’ bringing six third-place finishes in 10 Commonwealth Games and World Cups.

Ten-time world champions Australia are unsurprisingly bent on revenge and have already resorted to mind games.

Skipper Caitlin Bassett says England will not be able to cope with the heat that comes from being

World Cup host nation.

“I think back to Sydney [in the 2015 World Cup] and how much pressure and expectation were put on the home country to perform and win,” Bassett said. “I don’t think England will be prepared for that.”

Guthrie knows the Australian psyche well after two seasons playing in their domestic league and says a backlash is only to be expected.

“Australia will be coming for us, there’s no doubt about that,” she said. “They weren’t happy, as we wouldn’t have been had we lost by a goal.

“But we’re not afraid of that because we’re coming for them too. The belief could not be stronger within this team at the moment.

“Winning that gold medal marked a complete shift.

“We were labelled for a long time as a team that could produce good netball but not consistently enough over the big competitions. We were aware of that label and it was something we worked really hard to shake off.

“Last year we managed to break through that glass ceiling and come out on top.”

Australia would like to think of last year’s stunning triumph as a one-off, but England beat them again in the Quad Series in January.

Those results will be the reference points for Tracey Neville’s side – nights of glory rather than the litany of disappointments that preceded their victory on the Gold Coast.

The Roses, who go to the World Cup ranked third behind Australia and Jamaica, may have home advantage but that has done little for the sporting nation since 1966.

Guthrie sees it only as a positive, however, no matter what history – or Australia – tells her.

“It’s about taking it step by step, game by game,” said the Bath centre.

“If we do that we’re definitely in with a chance. “Knowing that anything can happen in sport keeps us on our toes and drives us. “That little bit of extra pressure or stress, plus home court advantage, might be just what we need to get us over the line.

“This is England’s best chance in a long time. We’ve got to go for it.” BACKLASH: Guthrie says Australia will be out for revenge