"We all thought for it a bit and said 'why not'."
Two other Kiwi teams joined them over in Adelaide: a women's team in the 65 and over division consisting of Tup Cox, Janice Larmer, Bev Evans and Jill Collins and a men's 60 and over team with Quentin Maisey, Larry Seales, Bruce Barrett, Allan Russell and Steve Brennan.
On the Sunday before the tournament the teams attended the opening ceremony at the Adelaide Basketball Centre in their New Zealand uniforms.
All of the Tennis Australia Seniors dignitaries were present including all the Australian world champions.
On the Monday and the Friday of the tournament, matches were played on astro grass and in between were on natural grass.
The team's first round match up was against NSW, who they played in the final in 2005.
New Zealand won five sets to three. They won all their matches in their section and led by two points at the end of the round-robin.
In the playoffs, they took on ACT and accounted for them comfortably.
This took them to the final, where only Western Australia stood between them and a memorable victory.
New Zealand had a slow start, quickly trailing 4-1.
But they didn't go down without a fight, taking the next five matches in a row. This left the score at six sets to four.
Western Australia picked up one more point but the pairing of Heywood and Rogers proved too much.
Heywood and Rogers won what would inevitably be the final set in a tie-breaker 7-5, meaning Agnew and Thorpe didn't have to complete their match which was delicately poised at 5-all.
This gave the New Zealand team the division title and bragging rights over their transtasman rivals.
Agnew said it was a real team effort but one player stood out.
"Heywood was our MVP. She was the only one to play in every tie as the rest of us took turns sitting out," she said.
"It was a bit disappointing that in the final the Western Australia supporters weren't very nice to us and clapped at our mistakes."
"No wonder why we don't like them when it comes to sport."
