KEY POINTS:
From the despair of a humiliating defeat at the hands of the Silver Ferns, to the high of a rare win against the world No 2s, England's Aussie coach Sue Hawkins has experienced the full spectrum of emotions in the past week.
Never did she imagine when she
took over the English side this year that it would be such a rollercoaster ride. Hawkins jokes that all the ups and downs will likely send her to an early grave, but you get the feeling she may consider that price worth it for the buzz she gets from her job.
Having overturned a 39-goal loss in the opening test, Hawkins rates Wednesday night's shock 40-38 win over the Silver Ferns as the most satisfying moment of her coaching career thus far.
"In the last couple of minutes of the game, I turned to the assistant coach and said: 'This is what coaching at international level is all about.' I had the adrenaline going in me, I had the goose-bumps and I just thought: 'This is fantastic, I love this,"' said Hawkins.
The most surprising aspect about the tourists' performance on Wednesday night was not that they won - the rise of the English netball team has been well-documented and they had already proven they were capable of scuttling the Ferns in last year's historic win in Manchester. Rather, the most incredible thing was that only 48 hours prior they were on the receiving end of one of the biggest ever losses at the hands of a New Zealand side.
After England's capitulation in the opening test it seemed almost inevitable that the Ferns would clean-sweep the series and send the tourists back to the UK empty-handed.
The English had already suffered a 2-0 series loss to the Australians before they arrived in New Zealand and Hawkins admits after the "smacking" her side received in the opening test, the thought crossed her mind that she may head home from her first tour without a win.
But Hawkins is a firm believer that sport is just as much a psychological battle as it is a physical one and she knew that to beat the Silver Ferns, she had to reaffirm belief in her charges.
"After Monday night I had that self doubt for a split second but you've got to let that go, if you keep thinking that way you'll never get anywhere."
So, adopting the old mantra "if you think you can do it, you can; if you think you can't do it, you're right", Hawkins drilled into her side the importance of believing in themselves.
"We couldn't change what happened, what we could do was change what was going to happen and we made a choice as a team to let it go and move on."
Not that Hawkins likes to take credit for the win.
She said the real plaudits should go to her team, who as a group were determined to prove they were capable of more.
"I like to ask them what they think and how they feel and get their ideas because they have to own their decisions out there on court, I can't make decisions for them so it's been a real collective decision on how we turn this game around."
Having "learnt how to win", Hawkins said the challenge for her side now is to prove they are capable of winning on a consistent basis.
"Our aim really was to come away with pride and make sure everyone knows that England will be nipping at their heels," she said. "I think we proved that last night, what we need to do is prove it again and raise the bar again for ourselves."
Being new to international netball, Hawkins has never experienced the challenge of having to get her side up for three tests in the space of a week.
The former Australian international, who coached the Auckland Diamonds in the last three seasons of the now defunct National Bank Cup, is used to having the luxury of a week between matches to dissect previous performances and prepare her sides for their next game.
But Hawkins is certainly warming to the difficulties of life on tour.
"It's definitely challenging but it's easy in the sense that you've got a different level of athletes, so when you put a suggestion forward they go: 'Yep okay, I understand that, yep I can take that information,"' she said.
"Sometimes you feel like you're overloading some athletes at a lower level, but these ones are just taking it all in."
A thought that will no doubt worry the Silver Ferns.
