Tara Murray
City West Falcons’ championship dreams are over after Netball Victoria pulled the pin on the Victorian Netball League season.
With uncertainty over when players could return to the court due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the league made the decision to end the season.
Netball Victoria at this stage isn’t planning to award premierships or minor premierships, but will announce most valuable player awards and teams of the year.
Falcons coach Marg Lind said it was the right decision for the competition.
“I think it was a wise decision in the end,” she said.
“There was talk about trying to get the finals up and running, but the safety of our players comes first.
“I wrote a letter saying I didn’t think it was safe to continue and that killed me to say as we were undefeated [in championship division].
“We would have been putting players in a situation where they had only trained together twice and played two games in a 10 week period.
“You would have needed a pre-season before playing again.”
For the Falcons, it’s a case of what might have been, especially in the championship division.
After a draw in round one, the Falcons were the standout team of the competition, going through undefeated.
Lind said it would be nice to get some recognition for their season, with every team having played each other at least once.
“We were sensational,” she said. “We had a number of new players this season.
“We were outright on top in the championship division and Blaze [North East Blaze] were outright in division two.
“Under-19s was where the issue was with any of the teams from one to 10 that could have won.
“It would be nice if we were recognised with something.”
Overall, Lind said she was thrilled with how the season had played out for the club overall.
As well as the championship side being undefeated, the division 1 side was fourth and the under-19s equal fourth.
“Our under-19s beat three of the top four sides in the last six rounds,” she said. “They are a very young squad, so it’s a good indication for next year.
“Division one was fourth. We hit our KPIs [key performance indicators] which is having all three teams in the four.”
Lind said the playing group would continue to hold online Zoom fitness sessions for the next few weeks, to keep the group engaged.
“Being on Zoom gives our girls something to do, many of them have nothing to do,” she said.
“We’ll probably keep that going for another month.
“We’ll likely have six weeks off and start looking to selection, hopefully we can go through the selection process
“There’s lots of things to look at and review.”
