Michael Burgess: Forget money, celebrate Silver Ferns' Netball World Cup win

Laura Langman, of New Zealand, celebrates with teammates after winning the Netball World Cup final. Photo / Getty Images

Money, money, money.

It's a shame the Silver Ferns' epic triumph last Monday has been sullied a wee bit by all the talk about dollars, mostly from people who seem to know very little about the economics of sport.

We should have been focussing on New Zealand's amazing victory, which was probably the best world championships performance (and certainly the most unexpected) in this country's netball history, especially as they were huge underdogs when compared with 1987 and 2003.

Instead, everyone got caught up in pointless and irrelevant comparisons with the economics of other sports, particularly the Black Caps.

Good on the Ferns players for not engaging in it, as shooter Ameliaranne Ekenasio emphasised.

"We play for pride, pride in the fern and the black dress," said Ekenasio. "That is what gets our passion burning. No one here plays for the money, no one ever has."

It's great that sponsors ANZ, Sky and MYOB have agreed to pitch in and a welcome bonus for the players, but the lack of prize money was no great scandal, even though it fed well into our #Outrage culture.

Netball has never offered prize money and odds are they never will.

But that's completely normal, for many sports.

How much prize money did Hamish Bond and Eric Murray scoop in the course of winning seven consecutive rowing world championships?

Not a dime.

The same goes for Lisa Carrington in her kayak, our various track cyclists over the years and our softballers.

It's the simple reality of most sports.

At the 2011 Netball World Championships in Singapore I talked to members of the Northern Ireland team, who had sold raffle tickets and packed bags in super markets to get to the tournament. The team had even considered a speed dating night, before getting cold feet.

Netball remains a sport of haves and have nots.

The Silver Ferns celebrate after winning the Netball World Cup final. Photo / Photosport

It has grown significantly in recent years in Australia and England, South Africa caught the eye with their fourth place finish at the world championships and Malawi is also improving.

The influx of imports into the New Zealand and Australian leagues has helped develop players across other nations.

But's there a long way to go, and some concerns. Look at Trinidad and Tobago; joint world champions in 1979, they could only win one game from eight in Liverpool.

Netball desperately needs to expand, and if they could get a foothold in China or India, then who knows where the sport could get to. Growing the game is the focus of the international body, and where it has to be.

But until then there will always be a natural ceiling, because of the limited global appeal of netball for broadcasters.

There's no agenda, and it's nothing to do with gender.

Cricket's riches are fuelled by the fanatical, massive Indian market; Football has a devoted following across the globe, like basketball, tennis and golf. Even a relatively minor sport like badminton creates millionaires, because it is A-list in Asia.

Let's not forget that netball in this country hasn't helped itself in recent years, either.

The farcical process which overlooked Noelene Taurua for the Ferns job in 2015 — driven by then high performance director Steve Lancaster — resulted in almost three years of near stagnation for the national team, which did nothing to help their profile, crowds or broadcast figures.

And the decision to abandon the trans-tasman competition in 2016 (made by the previous Netball NZ hierarchy) was ill-advised and will be costly in the long run. While there was a myriad of factors that went into the eventual rationale, it was conservative and a big step backwards. The domestic competition has since lost its pizzazz, which will be almost impossible to reclaim.

The Silver Ferns are wonderful athletes and tremendous ambassadors. Instead of moaning about the economics, let's celebrate the magic.