Kiwi netgirls prepare with Bob Marley

NEW Zealand national netball team, the Silver Ferns, left home for Miami, USA for a brief acclimatisation period  before heading to Jamaica for  Thursday’s start of the 11th Cable and Wireless World Netball Championship. This will be staged at the National Arena and the newly built, National Sports Centre.

The Ferns, ranked number two in the world behind world champions Australia, will be gunning to avenge their one-goal defeat by the  Aussies at home in Christchurch four years ago. “Everybody is so excited,” shooter Irene van Dyk told the New Zealand Herald. “We have all been waiting so long for this day,” she added. Captain Anna Rowberry, a member of the team beaten 42-41 by Australia in 1999, said she had been waiting “since the day after” that heartbreaking loss. “We have had enough of listening to Bob Marley, had enough of our heat chambers — we are as prepared as we can be,” she said.

Defending champions Australia and, home-town favourites Jamaica are expected to be New Zealand’s greatest threat. Van Dyke a South African-born naturalised New Zealander, had been in tremendous form in club action lately,  hitting the 100 percent target twice. She scored 64 goals of 64 attempts and later 54 of 54 in April this year. The Silver Ferns last won the World Championship title 16 years ago, in 1987.