Australian Netball Just Got Richer
Today was an incredibly special day for netball in Australia and the beloved players that inhabit the realm.
Yes, I’ve not been too pleased with how Australia Netball has been quiet (you can listen to our Goal Circle episode which discusses it here) ever since the ANZ Championship was put to sleep; the narrative hasn’t progressed as fast as some would like and Netball New Zealand announcing a massive amount of new signings and player movements hasn’t helped.
The main question is why has Netball Australia been so quiet. Well, two reasons: representative netball hit almost immediately after the trans-Tasman championship finished so the big time players were all caught up in more training, and the CPA increase / negotiation put a nice halt in proceedings moving forward.
Today saw Netball Australia announce a doubling— yes, a doubling — of player salaries due to a cash injection into the league that will see the best professional netball players actually, you know, get paid for the work they do.
This cap increase — which sees the overall cap for teams increase to $675,000 — allows the league’s players the chance to actually focus solely on their professional play rather than juggling two jobs and full time study at once, and, more importantly, see a worthy reimbursement for the time they put into the game they love.
In fact, being a professional netball player in the NNL (National Netball League) looks set to become the highest paid sporting position for women in Australia. The announcement also came with another sweetener: a clause that sees income (100% of said income) protection come into play if a player gets hit with injury or decides to start a family. (Congrats, Laura!)
If you follow the players lives on social media you’ll know that a lot of them study outside of their netball career and some also work full time or part time around training and game day. According to the announcement, players are still free to work and study during the hours of 10 am to 4pm, so those that are looking to find an outside balance still have the opportunity to do so.
My oh my, what a great step for the sport. All in all, it’s high time you hit that bandwagon with the rest of us because the netball train is moving like a bullet.
I made a nifty little Storify which covers the Twitter buzz and further information as well — find it below.
