Giants invest in youth for 2019 Super Netball season

Giants Netball have signed a trio of rising stars as the team opt for a more youthful look in 2019.

Kiera Austin has signed on for another season with the Giants. Picture: Getty Images

Giants Netball have secured the signatures of rising stars Jamie-Lee Price, Sam Poolman and Kiera Austin as the team opt for a more youthful look in 2019.

The team lost more than 500 matches of national league experience when Susan Pettitt, Serena Guthrie and Bec Bulley departed two weeks ago, but the Giants had prepared for the transition.

“Obviously we started with a very experienced team and I thought that was essential when you were building a brand new club,” head coach Julie Fitzgerald said. “But it’s nice to know that now when players do move on, we’ve got young ones ready to step up. It was inevitable for us that we would end up with a younger team, and I think that’s quite exciting and I’m really looking forward to that.”

Price was yesterday named in the 17-player Diamonds squad for the upcoming international season, giving her a golden opportunity to secure a place in next year’s World Cup.

Poolman was the statistical leader in a stingy Giants defence, and a member of the team’s leadership group this year.

Austin will also attend the upcoming national camp as a training partner, capping off a year of remarkable growth for the goaler who turned 21 this week.

Austin spent only 11 minutes on court all season, but made a surprise appearance at goal attack during the Giants’ preliminary final loss to Sunshine Coast.

The match was tied at that point, and Austin hadn’t taken a single shot in Super Netball. But she turned in a steady performance under pressure, tallying 12 goals from 16 shots.

Austin was already on the nat­ional selectors’ radar, but it was those minutes that earned her an invite to Canberra.

“We thought the calmness and composure she showed under enormous pressure was terrific,” said Diamonds head coach Lisa Alexander. The Giants have now built half of their 10-player team for next season, with captain Kim Green and English shooter Jo Harten already signed up.

“It is an exciting time for young talent to come through and really step up to fill in those shoes,” ­Austin said.

Fitzgerald said the team had more talent to announce soon.

Promising young shooter Kristina Brice announced this week that she was leaving to take a contract with New Zealand’s Mystics, increasing the speculation that the Giants are chasing a big name to pair with Harten in the goal circle.

The Diamonds announcement yesterday confirmed the rise of a new crop of netball stars.

The only changes to the 12-player team that competed at the Commonwealth Games have come through the retirement of Laura Geitz, Madi Robinson and Pettitt. Those experienced shoes have been filled by Emily Mannix, Kelsey Browne and Gretel Tippett, all younger than 27.

Browne’s inclusion in place of Robinson, her older sister, caps a two-year period of enormous growth for the Lightning wing ­attack who had spent most of her career watching her famous sibling from the bench.

Only three of the 12 Diamonds who won gold at the 2015 World Cup are still with the team.

Two of those are shooters: Caitlin Thwaites and current captain Caitlin Bassett.

Alexander said the national selectors were looking to the future and the team’s shooting stocks were “a bit of a concern” in a Super Netball environment loaded with international goalers.