In July 2021, Brisbane secured the rights to host the 2032 Olympic Games, winning a landslide vote amongst International Olympic Committee (IOC) delegates, 72 to five.
The news was well received by Australians who love their sport and particularly well by netball fans, who thought this may just be the sport’s best chance to finally debut on the Olympic program.
Roughly three weeks later, World Netball and Netball Australia launched a joint campaign in the hope of pushing their case for Brisbane 2032.
And although it feels like time is on their side, with almost a decade to go before the event starts, there are also plenty of factors working against them.
It took 20 years of lobbying and three failed attempts in 1967, 1983 and 1987 before netball was recognised by the IOC as an official sport in 1995.
And while this endorsement was a step forward, netball has since been knocked back at least four times in its quest to be included on the Olympic program – in 1996, 2008, 2011 and 2020.
There has reportedly been frustration over the years for World Netball, which feels as if the IOC has given them new hoops to jump through each time they have addressed a previous request; but as it stands, the main issues preventing netball’s inclusion lie in its appeal beyond the Commonwealth of Nations and the outside perception that it is mostly just a female sport.
Both of these potential obstructions will be explored in a two-part feature by the ABC, the first of which focuses on netball’s problems appealing to countries beyond the Commonwealth.
This is supported by the views of IOC vice-president and former AOC president John Coates, who played a key role in the planning of Brisbane’s 2032 bid.
“There’s just not enough countries that play the sport at an elite level,” Coates told News Corp in an interview last year.
“Additionally, all the sports are profiled and one of the areas considered is distribution rights and what is popular for broadcasters.
“Netball does not have the international broadcast appeal of something like gymnastics.”
Opportunities beyond the Commonwealth
Netball made its debut at the Commonwealth Games in 1990 as a demonstration sport, and from 1998 up until the Games held in Birmingham last year, has been classed as a compulsory sport.
Furthermore, of the 16 countries that have qualified for the 2023 Netball World Cup in South Africa, all but one is a member of the Commonwealth – Zimbabwe – which withdrew in 2003 over political differences but is now trying to re-join.
There are opportunities for the sport to expand its global footprint, particularly among the 11 member organisations (MOs) that currently hold a netball world ranking or rating and are also independent to the Commonwealth – Zimbabwe, the Philippines, Ireland, the UAE, the United States, Hong Kong, Israel, Taiwan, Thailand, Switzerland and Sint Maarten.
Perhaps the most glaring of these is the US, given its huge population and influence around the world, especially at an international event like the Olympic Games.
Pushing for a greater presence with this sporting powerhouse would make sense when you consider the fact that netball actually originated in American schools under the guise of women’s basketball in the late 19th century.
Despite these origins, there have long been issues with the governance of netball within the country, with two separate national sporting bodies locked in conflict over who should be the official MO.
The dispute, which has been ongoing now for at least 16 years, is slowly being worked through by World Netball, but is just one example of the problems holding back the sport’s capacity to grow on a greater scale.
Trouble in America
The two main bodies in the United States are known as the USA Netball Association (USANA) and Netball America (NA).
USANA is registered in New York and has been the official MO linked to World Netball since their inaugural meeting in May 1992.
Their constitution states their purpose is to act as the national governing body for netball in the US and as such, some of their responsibilities include: to preserve the integrity of the sport; support the development and promotion of netball at grassroots, in community-based settings, school and colleges; to establish a register of affiliated members, registered clubs and state netball associations; and to enable US netball athletes to sustain competitive excellence and growth through the selection and management of the USA national squads.
But, in the ABC’s research for this article, it was hard to confirm that USANA are in fact doing any of this, other than running the national team. And this is where the story gets tricky.
In 2006 and 2007, USANA experienced an exodus of administrators due to allegations of corruption, as well as reports of unethical behaviour displayed in front of their national athletes.
The majority of USANA’s affiliated members, clubs and associations are also said to have left the organisation on the back of these corruption allegations.
The issues were flagged with World Netball, but according to those involved, were never acted upon, despite a mediation being held and binders of information being sent to back up the claims.
Taking matters into their own hands, those that left founded a new national sporting organisation, NA, with the goal to develop the sport among American citizens, instead of focusing on targeting the expat community.
Registered on the other side of the country in California, with Aussie expat Sonya Ottaway as president, leading 10 staff and 80 volunteers, NA has since set up clubs in 33 US states and been endorsed by the USA Physical Education Association to introduce netball into US school curriculums. In 2023, they plan to introduce 35,000 students to netball for the first time.
Prior to this, NA estimates it has reached more than 200,000 American children and adults with its work, not only in the US, but across Canada, the US Virgin Islands, Colombia, Mexico, South Africa and Uganda.
Their Be An Inspiration program has particularly taken off, using private funding to recruit coaches and build netball courts. When COVID-19 restrictions prevented in-person activity, NA kept this program going in an online capacity, connecting girls largely from minority backgrounds with their netball-loving peers, as well as Olympians, coaches, and athletes from around the world.
Be An Inspiration has been recognised by tennis legend Billie Jean King and supported by Oprah Winfrey’s Academy. It has also won an award from the International Sports Council Association for being innovative during the pandemic.
At an elite level, NA has developed the first all-American citizen women’s netball team and has been running an annual US Open Netball Championships since 2009. The most recent edition, held in November in Las Vegas, featured players from 12 different countries and 22 US states and territories across 24 teams.
At the end of these championships, the Vicki Wilson MVP award is given to the best overall performing male and female player, as a thank you to the former Diamonds captain (104 Tests) for her close work with NA in the education space.
For all these reasons, NA argues its work is superior and that it should be the official MO linked to World Netball – especially if the sport has any hope of making it to the Olympics one day.
In comparison, USANA – the official MO for almost 31 years – is in a very different place. There’s no real update on their website beyond 2019 and the last event listed on their calendar was an umpire’s seminar held in June 2020.
Their Facebook page (just over 1,000 followers compared to NA’s 16,000) offers limited information about the national team’s run at the Americas 2023 World Cup Qualifiers in October; where the Flying Eagles won three of their eight games and finished sixth out of nine teams.
Even if we put aside USANA’s other responsibilities outlined in their constitution and purely focused on their work with their national team, the stats have not been in their favour.
The side has failed to qualify for a Netball World Cup ever since the administration exodus some 16 years ago. The team last featured at the major tournament in 2003, and the US has not sent an under-21 team to the last two World Netball Youth Cups held in 2013 and 2017.
Then there are the documented threats from previous USANA president Patrick Heron (2016-2023) to players, umpires and associations that wish to participate at NA’s US Open; warning them that they will be classed as ineligible for national selection and suspended from playing at their local association if they participate in any domestic event not affiliated with the official MO.
This extended to Netball Canada – despite its athletes recognising that the US Open “is arguably the best training tool for teams in North America” and appealing to World Netball for an exemption to participate – and also took the form of threatened legal action if certain parks and recreation offices went ahead in allowing NA to rent their facilities.
The confusing part about this, and the constant efforts to deter people from attending the US Open, referring to it as an “unsanctioned event”, is that some of USANA’s members are believed to take part in other NA competitions on a regular basis with no issue.
Beyond this, NA said the current MO has previously stolen photographs and information to pass NA’s work off as its own, and while all of this has been communicated with World Netball, there has been a lot of talk with little action from their end.
Heron agreed to speak with the ABC in March to give his version of events, but before a date could be finalised, a USANA annual general meeting (AGM) was held and he was voted out, bringing an end to his seven-year tenure as president.
Change at the top for USA Netball
There is no current document available to the public that details what happened at that AGM, but incoming president Radica Wright told the ABC that one of her priorities in her attempts to overhaul the organisation, will be to provide clear and transparent access to this type of information.
Wright grew up in Jamaica and after immigrating to the US in 1997, became a member of the Florida Netball Association. She has a background working in youth sports and founded the Netball Youth Sports Association in 2011.
Facebook posts from USANA suggest Wright has been aligned with the MO in various roles in the past (2015 — public relations officer, 2018 – development director working with the technical team), but Wright says that after expressing initial interest in these roles, she decided to step back from them and let the leadership “that wasn’t [operating] in a way that would allow the sport to progress,” to run its course.
At the time of interview, Wright said she could not provide exact numbers about the number of staff, volunteers, associations, or clubs USANA has on its books, as she only took the helm in the last fortnight after being elected on March 18 and is still working through its current state of affairs.
A consultant hired by World Netball to try and mediate the conflict in late 2022 has put in writing that USANA reported to have five full members across different states: New York, Florida, Arizona, Georgia and Massachusetts, and an associate member in California; but some of these are thought to be inactive or operating as a single team.
Wright admits the ties with some clubs and people are uncertain right now, as they have been “waiting in the wings” for fresh leadership to take the organisation in a new direction.
Despite this, the new president hopes a clean slate can be agreed to so the two bodies can establish a working relationship to grow the sport together in the US.
There is apprehension at NA about the idea, given the strained relationship in the past that has led to a lot of distrust.
Although World Netball has always hoped the two organisations might re-join somewhere down the line, NA said its work speaks for itself, that nobody within the US recognises USANA as the official MO, and as the larger body they would be stronger on their own.
If World Netball was to transfer the official MO title over, NA said it would be willing to consider taking on USANA employees, as long as they go through the HR process and have the right skill set.
But if World Netball will not recognise NA directly, it thinks the best way forward would be to create an entirely new organisation featuring two directors each from the existing bodies and a fifth independent director from World Netball. The purpose of this would be to work together to get teams ready for international netball events, while allowing the separate bodies to continue to work on their domestic goals.
Considering all of this, you have to wonder what sort of KPIs and requirements World Netball has in place for the rest of its MOs, and whether these types of issues are prevalent in other countries.
Either way, it is evident that they desperately need to take more initiative regarding this conflict, sooner rather than later, if the sport has any hope of demonstrating to the IOC that it has serious intentions to expand beyond the Commonwealth.
As it has already seen it take a step back at a university level.
Netball takes a step back at World University Championships
In America, many athletes and sports are propped up by college scholarships, and the most prominent compete at the FISU World University Championships, where future Olympians are born.
These championships are therefore regarded, at least anecdotally, as the ‘Junior Olympics’ – with the IOC closely monitoring the performance and participation of all sports involved.
In 2012, 2016 and 2018, netball was included on the program of events and although both organisations expressed interest, it was NA that was selected by the United States International University Sport Federation (USAIUSF) to enter a team.
Ahead of the 2020 championships, FISU pulled netball from its program, writing to World Netball – in a letter that has been obtained by the ABC – to tell them that the sport was too Commonwealth-focused and had failed to ensure its top-ranked nations were regularly participating at the event.
World Netball Statement:
World Netball has defended its long-standing relationship with USA Netball in a statement obtained by the ABC, describing it as, “good standing with enthusiastic volunteers”.
“The objective is to align the governance structure of the two organisations and these things take time, work is ongoing and progress is being made, building trust and a common objective between two strong bodies is something that cannot be rushed.”
“Growth in the USA is of course a very attractive proposition and we would love to see the sport thrive there.”
“We know there are so many who would benefit from joining our netball family and facilities used for other indoor sports would be ideal for netball, however, we have limited resources so we have to be strategic in our approach.”
Netball America Statement, Sonya Ottaway:
“It’s a shame that American athletes are not afforded the opportunities they deserve because they are not able to participate in World Netball events. The current USA MO can’t even qualify for the Netball World Cup or even produce a team to send to the World Youth Netball events. It is unfortunate that World Netball is only harming the global growth of netball by not addressing the glaring issues in the USA.”
USA Netball Statement, Radica Wright:
“I know the conflict has been going on for years, but I’m an optimist and believe we can turn it around. Whatever the qualms or the disagreement that was happening between the old regime [of USANA] and NA, I am not into that. We need to let the baggage go… we have a clean slate that we are working with.”
“I applaud NA for what they are doing … If they have personnel that are good in certain areas, then I want to suggest we come together and build the brand, so if NA can say, ‘you know what, it’s a new regime, it’s a new person’ then netball in America has the potential to do really well, and I strongly believe, once we get on board we have a better fighting chance of getting into the Olympics.”
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