Netball: Ferns camp evolving to suit pro era

Temepara George says the Silver Ferns are eager to implement any advice that could give them the edge. Photo / Getty Images

As the Silver Ferns wrapped up their build-up for their test series against Jamaica this week, a hive of activity was taking place on the sidelines.

Training was over, the players chatted happily as they stretched and warmed down. But in the stands coach Ruth Aitken was huddled over a laptop with the trainers poring over the latest data. Meanwhile, in the corner the medical staff gathered to discuss the players' recovery, while the skills coaches mingled, chatting one-on-one with the players.

As professionalism has continued to take hold in the sport over the past 12 months, the Silver Ferns' travelling roadshow has expanded dramatically - there are now seemingly just as many support staff as there are players.

Along with coaches Ruth Aitken and Waimarama Taumaunu, there are now specialist skills advisers Lyn Gunson and Belinda Colling. Then there's the strength and conditioning experts, power specialists, performance analysts, statistics gurus and medical personnel.

As Matt Kritz, strength and conditioning director for the New Zealand Academy of Sport (NZAS), points out - the Silver Ferns' management set up is now starting to resemble the professional sport model in the US.

"You have a cast of thousands on the sidelines for pro-football games."

Contrast that with the 1980s when Lois Muir cast a lone shadow on the sidelines of an outdoor court, barking orders at her players on a cold and miserable night, and the transformation is even more apparent.

But with the advent of a new semi-professional league and the international seasons getting more cluttered, the increased emphasis on sports science is a necessary development.

Kritz, who once famously compared the movement of some netball players to that of "baby giraffes", has played a key role in lowering the incidence of injury in the Ferns camp through studying the players' movement patterns, and tailoring their strength and conditioning programmes to complement this.

"My focus is very much on how the girls produce power and the change that has been implemented over the past couple of years is more about that quality of movement, to ensure all the training that we're doing is going towards performance, and not contributing to injury," said Kritz.

"Historically what you see across many sports ... is that you may have a very successful team but their incidence of injury is also very high. So what we're trying to do is keep the success up, be world-dominant, but not lose any time due to injury from training and competition," said Kritz.

"It's very important that we focus on how they're doing it, identifying things in their movement that might be not optimal, and adjust them."

The push to improve strength and conditioning is also a reflection of the increasingly competitive international environment.

England and Jamaica continue to make up ground on traditional netball powerhouses Australia and New Zealand, which have been aided in many ways through the opportunities provided by the transtasman league for their top athletes to gain weekly exposure to a strong franchise-based league.

Jamaica's performances on their Australasian tour over the past two weeks may suggest otherwise but they will be a key threat to the Ferns' hopes of defending their Commonwealth Games title next month, once their team is back to full strength. England, with one of the best defensive line-ups in the world, will also be dangerous.

There are four teams who are chances for Commonwealth Games gold, and beyond that the world title. With two pinnacle events in the next 12 months, the race for competitive advantage is on.

The Ferns need to continue to search for ways to eke out that extra 1 or 2 per cent performance gain.

With funding assistance from Sparc, Netball New Zealand have access to sports science experts at the NZAS, with US-born Kritz and Australian power specialist Mike McGuigan now firmly involved with the Ferns programme.

"It's about us making sure that we are getting an edge in any way possible," says Aitken. "I think the good thing is, they all come from different backgrounds and are very committed to putting their prior knowledge into a netball context.

"For us it's ensuring that all the conditioning, the fitness, the recovery, the nutrition is all top-notch, and giving players the best chance to perform at the [top] level on court."

Aitken said she had seen a huge shift in the players' fitness and physical capability.

"They are physically very confident now, and very strong. But looking at Australia you need to be."

But to get to that point it meant the players had to undergo a significant mental shift.

Traditionally any strength and conditioning work was done at home, and was the individual responsibility of the players. Once they came into camp, the focus switched to playing.

Now, in the lead-up to tests, players are still expected to maintain their gym programmes and undertake skill sessions as well as hit the court and do their netball-specific trainings.

Aitken said there were certainly some teething problems when they implemented the new regime at the beginning of last year's international season, in which the Ferns started poorly, suffering a series loss to a composite world seven team.

But Aitken believes the team are seeing the benefits of their hard work.

New Zealand vice-captain Temepara George, whose return to the Ferns last season after two years away from the international game coincided with the arrival of Kritz and McGuigan, admits after 10-15 years of doing things one way, it was initially hard to change habits.

"The old-school can be hard to let go, but Matt's encouraged us and shown us the science behind everything so that we know it will help us. And anything that we can do that will give us the edge going into these two pinnacle events, we're going to take it."