Netball: Shooting star who found a new world

By ALISON HORWOOD

Even sitting down, the first thing you notice about Irene van Dyk is her height. She is an Amazonian 1.9m, with wide netball-spanning hands and a smile to match.

In 2000, talkback radio lines clogged and the nation divided when the former Proteas' captain emigrated from South Africa and made her debut with the Silver Ferns.

Only five years earlier, van Dyk's prowess as goal shoot largely quashed New Zealand's hopes of a win at the 1995 World Netball Championships in Birmingham, England.

Still smarting from a one-goal loss to Australia at the previous world champs, the Ferns were favoured to meet their transtasman neighbours in the final in 1995 when van Dyk scored 59 goals, beating the Silver Ferns and putting her South African homeland on the netballing world map.

Switching allegiance to New Zealand after that kind of trouncing could never have been easy, but you get the feeling that if anyone could do it well, it would be van Dyk. For starters, most New Zealanders must be relieved to have her on our side. She often averages more than 90 per cent of what she aims for, and even Australian coach Jill McIntosh has called her the best shooter in the world at the moment.

Van Dyk is also an easy person to like. She has a reputation as a popular player, a crowd favourite and one of netball's pin-up girls. An English journalist described her as having the grace of a racehorse, the diffidence of a child, and legs that make Naomi Campbell look like Dawn French.

Yet despite the looks and glamour job, she is such a team player that she has to be reprimanded by team-mates and coaches for clapping loudly when the opposition score.

When we meet, she has been up all night for a promotional shoot. Despite the lack of sleep she laughs a lot (loudly), her doe-like eyes are bright and her energy levels infectious. Today is her birthday ("God, it's the big 30") and she is planning a morning tea shout for her new workmates at the Netball Wellington Centre, where she works as development officer, coaching primary, intermediate and secondary students and their coaches.

As van Dyk puts it, combining her love of netball and young people is the perfect job.

Next week, two years after van Dyk's bib-swap, her biography, Changing Colours, The Irene van Dyk Story, will be released by HarperCollins. Written by Russell Gray, a friend and sports editor for the Dominion, the book covers van Dyk's controversial move, her childhood in South Africa, family life and experiences with the Proteas and Silver Ferns.

Van Dyk was invited to come to New Zealand to play for Wellington's Capital Shakers in the 2000 Coca-Cola Cup competition. The decision to stay, making her available to be selected for the Silver Ferns, was largely made to avoid the fear and violence of South Africa and create a better lifestyle for her daughter, Bianca, now 4.

The public row over whether she should play for the Silver Ferns both upset and bewildered her, but she says she tried to remember the opposition was not against her as a person. International rules state that a player can play for only one country in a year.

She had strong support from Shakers' team-mates. All she wanted to do was live her life, play ball and go with the flow. As then coach Yvonne Willering says when talking about van Dyk's selection in 2000: "It wasn't as if we were bringing in overseas players just to beat Australia. I don't buy that, and if you look at what happened it took Irene a little time to settle in. New Zealand netball is multicultural anyway. There have always been Samoans and Cook Islanders involved and now there is a Fijian. At all times those chosen have made a commitment to New Zealand."

Van Dyk herself insists: "I came here to stay. It was not to play for a year or two, it was a lifetime decision."

Today she has no doubt about where her loyalties lie. Is she a Kiwi? "Absolutely. I will always have a soft spot for South Africa, but this is home. I even support the All Blacks."

The fourth and youngest child of Irene and Herman Viljoen, brought up on a farm in Meyerton, 30km from Johannesburg, Irene and her siblings were encouraged to play sport.

Ball games were organised on the farm at weekends. And, says van Dyk, she has her sister Janita to thank for her hands-above-the-head shooting style. Janita would spend hours practising at the goal hoop their father built on the farm, while little Irene's job was catching the ball and passing it back to her sister.

Irene began her own career on the court as goal attack because, unbelievably, she was too short for defence. Once the class midget, she began growing at 16 and didn't stop. By then she had switched to defence for her school team, and by 18 was named in the national top 10.

Next she made the Western Transvaal side and was chosen as goal shoot for the South African under-21 team. By 1994 van Dyk was selected for the Proteas, the baby of the team at 22.

It was a big year for South African netball - the team ended 28 years of isolation and joined the international arena by touring England. Van Dyk quickly made a name for herself, and not just for her sporting prowess. Some claimed she brought glamour to the sport and wowed the fans. In those days she and the rest of the South African team became known for wearing makeup on the court.

"It was our first trip out. Of course we wore lippy," she says. "The whole team wore makeup because it was our first time playing on television and we thought we had to look good."

Since van Dyk joined the Silver Ferns, New Zealand has beaten the Australians on their home soil at the Tri Nations. Hopes are high for the Commonwealth Games in Manchester, with van Dyk dubbed the secret weapon against Australia.

Although she is humble about what makes her one of the world's top shooters, others have listed her height advantage, athleticism, uncanny accuracy with the ball and her drive.

Husband Christie, a cricket development officer, is her trainer. She says he is a tough taskmaster and her greatest supporter.

"You should hear us when we train," she says. "He's like, 'Don't be a wuss'. I get so angry because when I get tired he works me harder, but if it wasn't for him I probably wouldn't be so dedicated."

In addition to her club and national side training, the couple usually work out for 90 minutes a day, mostly shooting.

"I don't know how he does it, but before I let go of the ball he can say, 'That won't go in, your shoulder or elbow is out'." And he's right.

She practises about 300 shots a day from the circle to the base line, static, moving, mock-falling, eyes open, eyes shut. She stops when the last 10 go through the hoop.

In the foreword, former Silver Fern April Ieremia says: "What sets Irene apart from other shooters is her ability to shut out what is happening around her and almost routinely make the shot from anywhere in the circle, against any defender. She's the kind of player teams cry out for."

Van Dyk, discussing her style, says: "I smile at my defenders. They hate it. The minute they see it, they think, 'She's having fun', which is not necessarily the case. I might just be trying to piss them off."

Four-year-old Bianca, who has a child-sized 2.5m goal outside their house, is already a natural. "She has an amazing pass," says her mother, "and can shoot several goals in a row."