Former Pulse coach and Silver Ferns selector Gail Parata. Photo / Photosport
Former Silver Fern and recently resigned national selector Gail Parata has claimed Netball New Zealand spoke to just seven players who had problems with ousted coach Dame Noeline Taurua before she was stood down.
It comes after Parata said Taurua’s standing-down sent a “chilling message to every coach in Aotearoa New Zealand” in a lengthy social media post.
But Netball New Zealand has emphasised that a confidential employment process remains ongoing and any claims made from other parties are “merely speculation and hold no substance”.
Taurua was stood down as Silver Ferns coach by Netball NZ before their Taini Jamison series with South Africa last month after what the national body called failed discussions concerning proposed changes to the team’s high-performance programme and environment.
In an update at the beginning of the month, Netball NZ said a resolution had not yet been reached and Taurua would be sidelined for the remainder of the year.
On Sunday, Parata said she had made the “difficult decision” to resign as a national selector to show her support for Taurua, and criticised how she had been treated.
Speaking on Newstalk ZB’s Mike Hosking Breakfast this morning, Parata said there are about 31 people in the Silver Ferns environment, including management and athletes – and claimed Netball NZ spoke to seven players who took issue with Taurua’s coaching approach.
“They spoke to five Silver Ferns plus two junior Silver Ferns. Why did they not speak to everyone? That’s really, really disappointing.”
She added that she understood a formal complaint hadn’t been laid against Taurua, so there had been “no other process to follow”.
Parata said she was also “in the dark” about the issues players had with Taurua, but pointed to a series of training games the Silver Ferns had against Super Netball club the NSW Swifts in late January.
Only the final game was open to the public, with the Silver Ferns losing 74-52 – but it’s understood the national side lost all four matches.
“[It] wasn’t a good look for our national team and so they actually probably deserved to get a bit of a blast about that,” Parata said.
She said she had been in the Silver Ferns environment as both a coach and national selector alongside Taurua and had never seen any “unsafe” coaching – as it has been described by players.
“It’s very scary to be a coach right now. The job is demanding, often voluntary for many, long hours and, you know, that type of thing can happen to any coach and next minute they don’t have a job.
“There needed to be due process, they needed to be transparent, fairness in there as well.
“They should never have done a review with seven athletes. That was just wrong right from the beginning.”
In a statement to the Herald, Netball NZ said it wished to reaffirm that a confidential employment process remains ongoing between Taurua and the Netball NZ board.
“Any claims made from outside of these two parties are merely speculation and hold no substance,” the statement read.
“We recognise the deep passion of our netball community and understand the frustration that comes with limited information. While we are unable to share further details at this time, we want to reassure everyone that we are committed to upholding a fair and respectful process throughout.”
Parata said her message to Netball NZ was that they need to reinstate Taurua and assistant coach Debbie Fuller.
“We’ve been preparing for the last four years for the Commonwealth Games and the Netball World Cup. This is now delaying our process forward for that.
“The new coaches don’t know the athletes right now. I mean, they’re brand new to them and we’re the ones that know exactly what the athletes can do and what our plan was.
“I believe that Dame Noeline and Debbie Fuller are the best coaches to take our Silver Ferns team forward. They’re visionary, they’re intelligent, they’re technical and smart - all the things that you need in world-class coaches, and so that’s one of the key reasons why I decided to step down.”
Benjamin Plummer is an Auckland-based reporter for the New Zealand Herald who covers breaking news.