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Den Dekker gets top job with SA side in new Australian National League
Friday, June 20, 2008By Netball SA
Garville coach and former Australian netball captain Michelle den Dekker has been named coach of SA’s first team in the inaugural Australian Netball League (ANL).The 20-member squad will be unveiled at ETSA Park at 6 pm Friday before the Subway Cup games.
The ANL is yet another exciting innovation for the 2008 season introduced to create a bridging competition between the State League Subway Cup level and the elite ANZ Championship.
It will be launched straight after the ANZ Championship and will involve 10 teams with sides from WA, Queensland, ACT, AIS, Victoria, Tasmania, NT, SA and NSW will have two teams.
Den Dekker says she is excited about the new challenge, a competition she sees as a critical move in the long-term future of Australia’s dominance of the world netball scene.
She says with the creation of the Trans Tasman ANZ Championship the gap between elite netball and State League Subway Cup was becoming too great.
“The elite was getting significantly better but the next tier was being left way behind, and I think the ANL will go a long way towards resolving that,” den Dekker says.
“This will give the next generation of champion players an option to take their game to the next level.”
The focus on the competition is to have players primarily in the Under 24 range and SA will use a mix of SASI, under 19 and 21 players and fringe players from the Adelaide Thunderbirds.
ANZ Championship players who have played in more than 16 quarters during the season are ineligible for the ANL.
“The SA squad was picked by each Subway Cup coach nominating the players they thought would be right for the competition and that list was then whittled down to 20 by the Netball SA Coaching Development Committee,” den Dekker says.
“Our game squad will be a group of 12, which we expect to be able to name by next Friday,” she says. “The assistant coach will be decided this weekend following a meeting between myself and Netball SA High Performance Manager Jane Woodlands.”
“What I really want to focus on with this group of girls is building some intensity, and preparing them for the next step in their careers. I don’t think they realise just how big that step can be.”
“Having a national competition in which to do it will help provide the focus and the impetus to get them there.”
SA will play in Canberra on August 2-3, Launceston on August 16-17, ETSA Park on August 29-31 and Perth on September 6-7.
The ANL finals will be played in Sydney on September 12-14.
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