The time has come. After two weeks of finals, which included six games, thousands of confused fans trying to work out the convoluted paths to the finals, one umpire falcon and a large pinch of controversy over sock colours, we have finally reached the grand final.
And – as nobody could have predicted – the team that finished first at the end of the regular season will host the game against the team that finished second. Thank goodness the geniuses at TTNL came up with this not-at-all-confusing system to figure that out for us:
The Queensland Firebirds will face the New South Wales Swifts in Brisbane in a game that’s being billed as ‘Netball’s State of Origin’. Which is completely true, as long as you ignore the ‘origin’ part, as more than half of each team’s starting seven doesn’t originate from the state they are representing.
Hang on, now that I think about it, that sounds exactly like the rugby league version. Carry on.
So what you really need to know is who to go for in this game. Sure, you could just blindly support the team from your home state like the sheeple you are, but what if your home state couldn’t even get its team into the finals this year? Or worse, you live in Tasmania? Not because they don’t have a team, just because that sounds like a pretty bad deal you got there.
So let’s examine the teams and see which one deserves your warm applause and half-hearted cheers in front of your TV, which will have no impact on the result whatsoever.
The History
Each team has won one premiership, the Firebirds in 2011 and the Swifts in the competition’s inaugural season, 2008. “So what?” you ask, quite rudely really considering I’m just trying to help you out. “How does this information help me make a decision?”
Well, since you asked so nicely, I’m going to tell you.
While the Swifts are extremely efficient at winning grand finals, having only appeared in one before, the Firebirds have a habit of carelessly losing them, falling to both the Melbourne Vixens (2014) and Adelaide Thunderbirds (2013). The common factor of both of those losses was that they bestowed second premierships on each of those teams. Whereas the year they won, they ran over the top of the Northern Mystics, who had not yet won a premiership.
So it seems that the Firebirds are jealous guarders of the keys to the ‘Premiers Club’. While they refuse to allow new entrants to the club, they’re more than happy to cut a second set of keys for someone who’s been there before, provided the previous entrant brings along a bottle of Grange.
Whether they’ll be prepared to do it for a third year in a row is another question, so the Swifts will have to be prepared to play a game of netball, just in case.
The coaches
Two very different personalities are at the helm of these two teams. The Firebirds have the kindly, yet stern Enid Blyton Headmistress Rosalee Jencke.
The players have been careful not to put a foot out of line since the first game of the season, when they lost to the Fever and were threatened with having to spend half-term scrubbing the floors instead of enjoying a feast with baked potatoes and lashings of butter.
In the other corner, we have our favourite stats man Rob Wright who looks like he’d be more at home at a Sheffield Shield game, scoring the match from the stands with his own score book and a glass of pub squash.
Wright is the first and only male coach in the Trans-Tasman Netball League and coincidentally, also the first and only male coach to take his team to a grand final. If he is successful on Sunday, this will be lauded as the triumph of men over a matriarchal society and journalists will wistfully hope that one day Australian male coaches of all codes will be appreciated as much as their female counterparts; that Darren Lehmann, Wayne Bennett and Paul Roos will be just as well-known as Lisa Alexander, Carrie Graf and Joanne Broadbent.
The Victorians
While it’s true the Victorian team, the Melbourne Vixens, didn’t make the finals this year, it’s important to recognise the presence of Victorian players, sneakily hiding within other teams. Between pronouncing their capital city’s name “Mal-bun” and their constant talk about laneways, it’s not really surprising that the Firebirds have restricted the Victorians in their team to just two.
The Swifts – who you think would know better – have no less than five Victorians in their squad. Make of that what you will, but proceed with caution, as before long they will be proposing the Sydney Opera House is demolished to build a Federation Square replica and the harbour is concreted over to allow for more laneways.
The socks
Where the Swifts do shine, however, is their choice of inner-shoe foot coverings. While the Firebirds all opt for regulation socks, Swifts captain Kimberlee Green has shown she is not afraid of competition administrators and their short sock fetishes, instead putting her most fashionable foot forward and embracing the long sock trend.
Cleverly enough, she has also “rested” herself for a few previous games, so as to pretend she has a “calf injury” that will allow her to wear these devilish leg coverings. We bow to your scheming Kim, you are a true genius.
The cast of characters
Last but not least, we have the ragtag bunch of players who make up the two teams. The journeywomen Caitlin Thwaites (Swifts) and Bec Bulley (Firebirds) are each on to their third team in eight years, searching for redemption and Australian Diamonds selection. Of course, they are also both Victorian, so don’t get too excited.
Then we have the imports, Romelda Aiken (Firebirds / Jamaica) and Jade Clarke (Swifts / England) who we hope play brilliantly in this game and then suffer temporary memory loss on their way home, which results in them forgetting how to play netball until after the World Cup in August.
We have the young guns, Paige Hadley (Swifts) and Kim Ravaillion (Firebirds), who are just so excited to be allowed skip their afternoon nap to play in this game, that they’ll dose up on red frogs and squeal around the court on a sugar high.
And last, but not least, we have the contenders for Best Supporting Actress in a Netball grand final – Laura Geitz (Firebirds) and Sharni Layton (Swifts), whose work snapping back in shock at the slightest brush from a shooter makes Italian football players look like Dawn Fraser attempting to play herself in an episode of All Saints in comparison.
The conclusion
So there you have it, all the information you need to make a decision. Use it wisely, or suffer the embarrassment of choosing the losing team and hearing the taunts of your friends and colleagues for weeks to follow.
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