Netball: Relegated Huias will have a sniffing chance of returning to Super 8 tonight

HHSOG Huias coach Rebecca Martin says dropping to senior grade netball on Saturday requires some key adjustments. PHOTO/FILE

The impact of the promotion-relegation system can vary from agony to ecstasy in sport.

For Hastings High School Old Girls' Proactive Huias, plummeting from Super 8 premier club netball in Hawke's Bay has made them stronger as a team, according coach Rebecca Martin.

"We're just a group of women who love to be together so from there we have no dramas but just the love of netball and people on the sidelines cheering," says Martin, before her troops play Havelock North House of Travel Kauri to earn the right to return to Super 8 at the Pettigrew-Green Arena, Taradale, from 6.15pm today.

Kauri finished last in the crossover two-pool, four-round, eight-team shield competition within the Super 8 campaign last Friday night while Huias are the top qualifiers of the outdoor Saturday Hastings Pak'nSave senior club competition after they were relegated during the grading tournament early this season for the revamped Super 8 competition.

"It"s a good time for us to test ourselves so it'll be good to be back up there," says Martin, who believes her Abby Breakwell-captained Huais have what it takes to return to the elite stage.

Huias were a mainstay at the former Super 6 level for eight years.

"A chapter of things happened in grading and we just weren't good enough," says Martin, who lost a couple of players three weeks after their trials, crossing the floor to other teams to leave her with a squad of nine.

"We then had three players away at the World Masters and honeymoons and two to major injuries so when it came to grading we only had four to six players [from the previous season] left in our team but that's just the way it is."

The senior competition, says Martin, means Huias have had to create speed, rise above to produce skills and adjust to a different level of umpiring, not to mention the elements.

So how hungry are Huias to gain promotion?

"Mmm ... we're just loving our netball. Whatever comes, comes."