Steel Looking To Set The Tone At Super Club

The Ascot Park Hotel Southern Steel are looking to make their mark at this year’s Super Club, which begins this Sunday in Nelson.

Steel join all five other ANZ Premiership teams, along with international club sides Collingwood Magpies (Australia) and Wasps Netball (England) at the tournament, which runs from 8-13 December at the Trafalgar Centre.

Super Club will be a test of the Steel’s pre-season conditioning and training, with a tough schedule of five games over six days.

It will be the first opportunity for fans to see the exciting 2020 Steel line-up in action, featuring a new-look shooting end with Trinidad and Tobago shooter Kalifa McCollin combining with Jen O’Connell.

McCollin has settled into the Steel environment well and is looking forward to her first outing in new team colours.

“It’s been pretty awesome coming into the environment with the girls. They’ve all been really welcoming and we’ve been working hard to build connections out on court,” she said.

“I’m really excited to play at Super Club – I played there during the first year of the tournament with a team from Trinidad and Tobago so to come back and be able to go up against some of the world’s best players will be awesome.”

Ascot Park Hotel Southern Steel head coach Reinga Bloxham is looking forward to seeing where her side is at, with an eye on the upcoming 2020 ANZ Premiership season.

“It’s been good to have everyone in and start seeing the combinations come together on court. We have a really exciting team and I’m looking forward to seeing what we look like in real time and under pressure at Super Club.”

The Steel open their Super Club campaign against Wasps at 5pm on Sunday in the second match on opening day, with live coverage of all games on Sky Sport 3.

Super Club provides the perfect opportunity to build leading into the 2020 ANZ Premiership season, which opens on March 15.

The 2020 schedule now sees two games played on a Sunday and one game filling the popular Monday night spot, while also enabling teams to host more home games.

Next season the Steel have seven home games, with five matches at ILT Stadium Southland in Invercargill and two at More FM Arena in Dunedin.

Season membership renewals are open now, with sales to past members available from December 10 and all new memberships from December 12.