Romelda Aiken-George to set new ANZ Championship-Super Netball record, eyes greats of the sport
Romelda Aiken-George will become the most capped player in the ANZ Championship-Super Netball era when her Adelaide Thunderbirds play the NSW Swifts. And the all-time games list is in her sights.
Just two years after Romelda Aiken-George’s elite netball career seemed in tatters, the 36-year-old is on the cusp of becoming one of the sport’s most capped national league players of all time.
Two seasons, two grand finals and a premiership after Aiken-George left the club at which she had spent 15 years, Aiken-George sits in equal fourth place on the national league all-time games list.
On Sunday, she surpasses England great Geva Mentor for the most matches played in the ANZ Championship-Super Netball era, with her 233rd cap.
But the achievements of the Adelaide goaler, who started her Australian career with the Queensland Firebirds before playing a grand final with the NSW Swifts and then, last year, winning a premiership with the Thunderbirds, are not just restricted to the professional era.
On Sunday, she will surpass the tally of not just Mentor, but also Susan Pettitt (Pratley) and Caitlin Thwaites (both 232 games), whose careers started in the Commonwealth Bank Trophy era, and sit just three matches shy of Nat Medhurst, who has 236 national league matches.
And if she lines up in every match of the season – as she did last year – she will also leapfrog Bianca Chatfield (244) to sit behind just Cath Cox (254), underlining her status as a legend of the game.
“I think it’s pretty huge,” Aiken-George said of passing legends of the sport like Mentor.
“I think playing ANZ and playing in the Suncorp Super Netball, the game itself just keeps on evolving and I’m so happy that I’ve been able to stay in the game and keep finding the fun in being on court and being at training.
“It’s a pretty cool gig. I get to do what I love every day and do it with the people I enjoy being around.”
It’s fitting that Aiken-George will reach new territory playing against the Swifts.
After 15 years at the Firebirds, the club decided not to offer her a contract for 2023 after her return from a season of maternity leave.
On hearing Aiken-George would be available, Swifts coach Briony Akle reached out, offering the new mum an opportunity as a training partner, as insurance for Trinidad and Tobago shooter Sam Wallace-Joseph, who was still rehabbing after a knee reconstruction and expected to be unavailable for the start of the season.
In the end, Wallace-Joseph sat out the entire season, with the player known universally as Didi helping the Swifts to the grand final they agonisingly lost in extra-time to the Thunderbirds – the team she joined the following year and helped to back-to-back titles, finishing with MVP honours in the grand final.
“I think it’s been a journey of being on different teams, having to experience different cultures, but to be (setting a new ANZ-Super Netball record) in pink, how exciting,” she said.
“Obviously playing against Swifts, I’ve played with them before, so I think it’s so amazing that I get to do it against them – lovely bunch if girls but to play such a milestone game in front of the pink army is going to be exciting.
“I’m very excited and nervous at the same time but it’s something so special that only some players can dream of having that opportunity.”
Aiken-George’s move to Australia in 2008 led the way for a generation of Jamaican players that now play Super Netball and dominate the league.
While she’s still playing for the Sunshine Girls, Aiken-George has Australian residency and an Aussie husband in former NBL basketballer Daniel George, with whom she shares a daughter, Gianna, 2.
But she never thought she’d last as long as she has in the game.
“Not after the first year. I think when I first came here it was very culture shock but I think again, the friends that you make, it’s just been amazing how much they have helped me to evolve myself and helped me to stay in the game,” she said.
“I’ve made some awesome friends along the way and I’m just super grateful for everyone who has played even just a small minute of my life in netball, I’m so super grateful for that.”
The Thunderbirds have a tough job on Sunday in one of the most anticipated games of the season.
Just three rounds into the competition, the Thunderbirds – who have made no secret of the fact they’re chasing three in a row – and Swifts, whose superstar signing Grace Nweke has helped them to an unbeaten start, are the pacesetters and their clash will be a blockbuster.
While Aiken-George will battle Diamonds goalkeeper down one end, linking with Lauren Frew and one of the most exciting young players in the competition in Georgie Horjus, it’s the other end of the court that’s garnered the most attention and speculation ahead of the match.
The Thunderbirds possess the best defence in the competition in the form of Jamaican stars Shamera Sterling-Humphrey and Latanya Wilson – both huge Aiken-George fans – and Diamond Matilda Garrett, who will face a massive battle against Nweke, England’s Helen Housby and Diamonds midcourter Paige Hadley.
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