Netball: Ferns expect mother of all battles

By Richard Boock

Belinda Colling is not best pleased by a suggestion that Australia's champion netball team is on the wane.

The Silver Ferns skipper has warned her team-mates to steel themselves for the mother of all battles should they come up against "the neighbours" during the World Netball Championships, which start in Christchurch on Tuesday.

New Zealand ended a five-year losing streak against Australia in February when they triumphed by a 12-goal margin, but Colling said that win would count for nothing unless it was repeated in Christchurch over the next fortnight.

"They'll be a lot tougher this time around," the Otago goal-attack said from Dunedin yesterday.

"For starters, they'll be anxious to avenge their loss, they'll always lift their game in a world championship atmosphere, they have a crack mid-courter back in Carissa Tombs and for some of their players (notably captain Vicky Wilson) this will be their swansong."

Colling would not buy into talk that Australia's star-studded side was becoming a shade long in the tooth, notwithstanding the fact that several players are attending their third World Championships [and Wilson her fourth] - instead suggesting that when push came to shove, the experience could prove invaluable.

"The dynamics have changed a little since that win over the Aussies in February," said Colling. "In a lot of ways we had almost won that game before we went out on the court.

"We'd made a notable progression through the previous 12 months and the loss to Australia in [last September's] Commonwealth Games final only deepened our resolve to knock them over at the next opportunity.

"We were so devastated after losing that final ... there was just no doubt what was going to happen next."

These days, however, Colling readily concedes that Australia are far better prepared for the World Championship challenge and believes the loss in February will have only alerted them to the capabilities of the Ferns and the need for a stronger performance next time around.

"We'll have to be better, because I know they will be."

Colling, who turned 24 last Sunday, said New Zealand were hardly lacking World Championship experience themselves, although it seemed that all the tournament "veterans" were stacked down one end of the court.

Of the top starting seven expected, the entire defence end and mid-court played in the semifinal against Australia in Birmingham, while the shooting end has no experience of a World Championship environment.

Colling, Donna Loffhagen, Teresa Tairi and Adine Harper were all brought into the fold after the disappointment of 1995 - in Harper's case, it was recently as this season, when she gained a brace of caps against South Africa.

"It's a bit different, the fact that no one in our attack end has played in the WNCs," Colling said. "But we can't make a big deal of it because most of us have still played a lot of top netball."

Coach Yvonne Willering agreed, suggesting the experience and maturity on board would help New Zealand settle quickly into tournament mode.

"They're experienced, there's a core of players who have been there and done that," she said.

"They've had the fear of failure and they've also had the joy of that win against Australia.

"Okay, that game has obviously been left behind now, but the actual feelings within have certainly developed with time."