Paige Hadley reveals her surprise at becoming emotional during Netball World Cup selection call

That was last Friday, later in the week than originally planned, due to the CPA dispute between the players and the governing body.

It was also unlike 2015, when the bolter came from the clouds to play a junior but still thrilling role in a home triumph.

Or 2019, when hers was a could-go-either-way inclusion in a squad that has to settle for silver by the most slender margin in Liverpool.

Hadley was always going to be in the team for Cape Town; ranked behind only captain Liz Watson among the midcourt certainties.

Or at least that was what virtually every amateur selector had flagged.

The fill-in skipper for the last Test series against England had delivered quality international performances after a calf injury limited her 2023 Commonwealth Games involvement to less than two quarters, but, still, as the 154-game Swift points out: “They’re all as stressful, I think, as each other. You just never know til you know.’’

On Friday, the captains’ run finished at 12.30pm. Hadley dashed to her car and pulled over a little way out from Sydney Olympic Park to wait for the scheduled 1.10pm call from Stacey Marinkovich.

“As soon as Stacey came on and said ‘We’d like to congratulate you and you’ve been selected in the 12’, I just started crying, and I was like ‘Gosh, I didn’t think I’d get emotional’,’’ Hadley recalls, before elaborating on the reasons why.

“My journey in the Diamonds has been like a roller-coaster, but under Stacey I feel like she believes in me, and to get that phone call and have it said to you and cemented there was really special.

“Then obviously being able to tell your family and friends and (see) their excitement it doesn’t matter if it’s your first or my third now, they’re just as special as each other and this group is really special to be a part of, and it’s so hard to be a part of, as well.

“There’s so many great players, so I’d kind of put it in the back of my mind going ‘All right let’s focus on Swifts’, but then when that moment comes… it was an overwhelming feeling of ‘Wow, I get to do it again, I get to be part of this group again, and go to the World Cup.’’

Again. This time as the third oldest Diamond behind the retiring Ash Brazill and vice-captain Steph Wood. But the only one with World Cup gold already in the bank.

*****

Being the sole survivor from the Sydney 2015 team is a sign of her age, Hadley joked to a few teammates this week, but her growth as a player and person since then gives her an appreciation for what Marinkovich, too, has been building since her appointment in mid-2020.

“It’s going to be a really challenging World Cup, but I think it makes you hungrier and want to work harder to be able to get that gold, and finish off what we started off as a group under Stacey three years ago,’’ Hadley says of a team that now holds all but (this) one of the sport’s major trophies.

One initiative this year was a weekly “Diamonds Connect” Zoom session held each Tuesday afternoon to build relationships within the squad, and cover everything from admin matters to opposition analysis and team culture.

Yet the experience Hadley brings is not in Test caps (40 since 2013), so much as her years of involvement, and as a dual premiership-winning acting/co-captain with the much-respected Swifts, who host the Adelaide Thunderbirds in Saturday night’s Super Netball major semi-final after sweeping nine of their past 10 games.

Her value generally is less about other numbers – “I’m probably not the one that gets all the stats or is always spoken about,’’ she says – as playing her role in any of the three midcourt positions. Primarily wing attack for her club, and at centre for the Diamonds, where she relishes the freedom but also appreciates the need to combine with the dynamic playmaker Watson.

“Ideally centre’s probably my position,’’ admits Hadley, who sometimes switches with her Swifts’ teammate Maddy Proud in the pivot. “Wing attack is a completely different style of game and I love the challenge of being able to set up plays and connect with your goal attack and that kind of stuff, but I think the games that I’ve played this year I feel so free going back to centre.

“So I know going back into Diamonds there’ll obviously be a few tweaks to my game in terms of defensively on working on centre pass structures and stuff. But Lizzy is obviously a world class player, so anyone that gets to play with her it’s an amazing opportunity, so you’ve just got to let her do her thing and then you just balance the court and inject when you need to inject.’’

Then there’s the off-court.

An example: despite tweaking her calf in the days before entering the Commonwealth Games Village last year, Marinkovich stuck with her original selection to give her the maximum recovery time, while Hadley, ultimately unable to contribute on-court, became an extra assistant coach.

She is effusive in her praise of Kate Moloney, who took on a huge workload at centre in her place — in the days before injury reserves could be called in, as now — and felt not just huge sympathy when Moloney was relegated from the 12 to a travelling reserve role this time, but sent a message of support.

“Absolutely I reached out to her. Not that you could flip a coin, but it is so hotly contested, and I think it comes down to positional (needs), it comes down to form right now, it comes down to what the selectors want, but I said to Kate I think she’s been immense for this group.’’

And added that all 15 who make up the touring party are “going to be a massive part of it, whether it’s on the court or off the court’’. Moloney’s reply, in part: “Thanks ‘coach’, now I can support you and help you.’’

Sisters in arms. Etc.

*****

A three-game stint as captain when Watson and Wood were rested against the Roses late last year reinforced something else to Hadley.

“It’s just knowing that what I’m doing and who I am and what I bring to the Diamonds is valued and I don’t need to change to be someone else,’’ she says.

“I’m not probably the superstar or the loudest, but I think being able to bring that into Diamonds and still being that passionate person that I am at Swifts and bring that love and care for everyone that I have.

“I do find it challenging sometimes, going from Swifts to Diamonds, and that environment can be quite intimidating and sometimes that brings out the best in you and sometimes it doesn’t and I think under Stacey she has kind of brought out the best in me.

“So it was a massive honour. I’m still in shock that I even got to captain Australia. Last year I was like ‘oh wow’. Like that was really cool.’ So for me it’s being my authentic self and bringing that passion and that drive that I have in Swifts land into that Diamonds dress as well.’’

Hadley has never watched the replay of the 2019 World Cup final that New Zealand’s Noeline Taurua-led underdogs won 52-51. Too hard. Too painful. Too, well, “heartbreaking”.

“After the game you’re obviously proud of your efforts and playing for your country, but you only have that once-every-four-year opportunity to have that exact group together and achieve something great together, which is so special when you do.’’

She was on the bench that day, as she was in the gold medal game in Sydney in 2015 being wing attack Kim Green, and last year’s joyful decider in Birmingham as she nursed that dodgy calf.

Something else to aim for at the World Cup, it seems. “I would love to be able to be on that court,’’ Hadley admits. “Onwards and upwards, 2023, hopefully this is the year to be able to win that gold and be on the court as well.’’

They are different beasts, netball’s two pinnacle tournaments, despite — unlike some sports — all the leading teams participating in both. At the Commonwealth Games, there are other outlets and events, whereas World Cups are for the netball diehards, where just walking down the street or into a cafe is almost a guaranteed engagement with the fans.

Hadley has had success in both, and is prepared for the need to be in the moment as well as the team bubble, but ready to go when the whistle blows. The workload is eight games in 10 days, as Africa hosts its first World Cup — although, for the girl from Penrith, there is business closer to home to take care of first.

*****

Hadley and defender Maddy Turner are the only current Swifts who were around for the final year of the ANZ Championship, before the mass exodus of more than 300 games of national league experience when SSN was ushered in for 2017.

With Maddy Proud, Helen Housby, Sarah Klau and the injured Sammy Wallace, they remain the dedicated core of an admired and united club that won the 2019 and 2021 titles under Briony Akle. All apart from Hadley are from interstate or overseas.

“A lot of those players would have come for opportunity and then probably would have been thinking ‘Oh, I’ll move on’. But they’ve been here for seven-odd years, so I think that’s testament to what this club’s about. People don’t want to leave; once they’re here, they want to be a part of it, and I think it’s been huge.

“We obviously get along really well and I feel like we’ve kinda grown up together, going through all the ups and downs of the netball journey and a life away from the court as well, so I think it’s super-special and I feel very grateful that they’ve come over in 2017 and stayed for so long.’’

Having been pipped for fourth spot by a single goal last year, despite losing Wallace to an ACL tear in the opening round, the Swifts have defied predictions and a sluggish start and activated wildly-overqualified training partner Romelda Aiken-George to carry the minor premiership into this year’s play-offs.

That will start against the only opponent Akle’s side has not beaten, with the controversial half-time abandonment in round two leaving the four points split, before Adelaide prevailed 60-57 at Ken Rosewall Arena in round 14.

What turned out to be a virtual dress rehearsal took a couple of upsets to confirm as a return performance on the same court on Saturday, and if Hadley’s own was not her best, she is “absolutely pumped” by the chance for personal and group atonement.

The Swfits, she says, will need to return to their usual clinical ways in attack, cut the cross-court passes that invited interceptions from Jamaican stars Latanya Wilson and Shamera Sterling, adjust to the T-birds changes during the Power Five, and execute the precise possession game that has served them so far in tight finishes, particularly, with seven of their 10 wins coming by five goals or less.

It started shakily, though, with a first-up spanking from the Magpies, that controversial abandoned game in Adelaide, then the emotions involved in eking out a narrow defeat of the winless Firebirds under popular ex-Swifts’ assistant Bec Bulley, and an 11 goal loss to the Fever to have just six points from four games.

“It was just like ‘Holy hell’,’’ Hadley laughs now. “We were kind of thrown a few curve balls early, so it definitely wasn’t the netball we wanted to play… Early on we were like ‘gosh, this is not how we wanted to start’.

“But it was always going to take time — especially in that attack end with Romelda’s completely different to Sammy, and completely different again to a moving circle, which we had last year, and the season is so short that you don’t have a lot of time, and I’m proud of this group to be able to build each week as we’ve progressed on.’’

More Coverage

Enormous toll: How hellish season impacted Diamonds WC star

Emma Greenwood

Four years ago, when the World Cup was played during a contentious mid-season break, Silver Fern Katrina Rore returned as a late-season Swifts replacement and completed the SSN-NWC double. Which is something Hadley will be among those attempting to emulate in the next six weeks.

“It’s so exciting,’’ she says. “When the (congratulatory) messages started flowing about the Diamonds team, I was like ‘All right, first things first, I want that premiership with the Swifts, that’s the main focus, and then close that chapter and go into Diamonds environment’.

“That’s the dream right, to be able to get both of those? What Katrina Rore got in 2019 would be amazing.’’