by Nova Weetman
As the siren sounded, I felt sick. I couldn’t believe what I was about to do. It went against everything I’d ever learnt about fair play.
It was our centre pass. As the whistle went, I dropped back to let Maggie take the centre. It was a standard passage of play, and my opponent followed. Maggie was looking to pass the ball to me, but the GD was blocking and I couldn’t get around her. Tess couldn’t get out either, so Maggie had to pass it back to Becky, our Centre.
The play went back and forth like that for a while. It was so frustrating. I knew if I couldn’t make a break out, we weren’t going to get a goal. I took a deep breath, hating what I was about to do. I called for the ball and ran forward, my opponent going up against me. As we jumped for the ball, I bumped her hard, crashing into her strapped leg. I heard her gasp as we landed. Ignoring my conscience, I passed the ball off fast to Becky and took off down the court, ready for the pass back. The GD was trying to catch me, but I could see she’d slowed down. I had to make the most of it. I passed the ball to Maggie and ran for the goal circle. I caught it just inside the ring and shot a perfect goal. A few more like that, and we might be back in the game.
Instead of high-fiving me, Tess threw me a look. ‘What was that?’
She’d obviously noticed the bump. I shrugged. ‘Nothing.’
She didn’t look like she believed me. And besides, the GD was now limping her way back to the line.
It was their centre, but with my opponent unable to catch me, I could help defend their attackers. I tapped the pass off and Maggie caught it. We were off again. This time Tess shot the goal.
As we walked back for the next centre pass, I saw their coach talking to the umpire. The GD was called off the court. I felt horrible as I watched her limp to the bench and sit down, clearly in pain. They had ice on her in seconds and I knew they’d probably get a doctor up to check her out. This was my fault. I’d let Justine tell me what to do and now it was on me. She might have torn her ankle ligament – or worse. She might not be able to play for the rest of the season.
Suddenly, I didn’t want to play anymore. The thought of what I’d just done made me feel sick, and I couldn’t pretend that I was okay with it. Just as I was about to rip off my bib and storm off the court, Tess came up behind me.
‘Edie? We can win this. I don’t know what’s going on, but you need to focus.’
I wanted to tell Tess what had happened, but there wasn’t time. They were sending on a replacement GD.
‘Okay?’ she asked, catching my eye.
I nodded. ‘Okay.’
I played the rest of the game in a bit of a daze. My new opponent wasn’t as good as the other one, so I managed to beat her without much trouble. Once we’d scored a few goals, the rhythm of the game changed, and we started to play differently. More determined. More like a team.
Suddenly we were fourteen-all. It was our centre pass and I could hear Justine screaming instructions from the sidelines. I shot her a look and as I did, I noticed the injured GD crying on the bench. I felt like my feet were glued to the ground.
The whistle went and I snapped back to the game. I ran out and caught the ball, passing it off fast to Maggie. She flicked off another fast pass to Becky, and then I was down in the goal ring. The ball came flying in my direction and I snatched it clear. I could make this shot. I was quite a way out from the ring, but Tess was stuck behind two defenders, and she couldn’t get out.
‘Shoot, Edie!’ I heard Justine yell. I knew the siren was about to go. I had to make a decision. If I hadn’t injured my player and caused her to land the way she had, we would have been thrashed. The game was only close because I’d cheated. I didn’t want to wear that. Not for anyone.
I lined the shot up. I couldn’t believe what I was about to do. But then the ball left my hands and I saw it hit the ring and bounce off, dropping just short of a goal. Tess tried to grab it and take another shot, but before she could, the siren went. The game was over. We’d lost by one.
I shook hands with the other team, and waited for Tess to come and grill me. It didn’t take long.
‘No way you could have missed that. What’s going on?’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, feeling like I’d let everyone down. First by cheating, and then by missing a shot I could have nailed.
‘What for? Did you deliberately miss?’ asked Tess, looking horrified.
‘Yeah.’ I couldn’t meet her gaze.
‘Why?’
I realised that everyone else had left the court, and it was just Tess and I still standing in the ring.
‘Justine told me to target my opponent because of her ankle. So I did, and now she’s over there crying. Because of me. That was the only reason we were winning,’ I admitted, relieved to be able to tell someone.
‘Why didn’t you just say no?’ said Tess, making it sound simple.
‘I tried. Justine told me if I didn’t bump her, I’d be benched. Now I wish I’d taken the bench.’
Tess looked horrified. Her mouth was open, but no words were coming out. ‘That’s … that’s …’
‘Shocking? I know. So that’s why I deliberately missed the goal. I didn’t think we deserved to win, not like that.’
I waited for Tess to get angry with me. Bumping a player was one thing, but throwing the game was even worse. Losing this game could make all the difference to where we ended up on the ladder. Tess didn’t say anything. Instead she just threw her arms around me. I couldn’t believe how good it felt, knowing she completely understood why I’d done what I’d done.
We walked off the court and I grabbed my drink bottle, trying to avoid Justine. I figured there’d be a big lecture to come. The rest of my team looked shattered. We’d come so close to beating the Warriors. They were probably all pretty mad at me at that moment, but I’d just have to deal with it. There was no way I could tell them what I’d done.
‘Thought you’d been practicing shooting from that far out,’ said Justine, looking furious.
I was about to try and defend myself when Tess whirled around and did it for me. ‘I can’t believe you’d ask Edie to deliberately target a player. That’s not okay, Justine. I bet Kathryn Fraser wouldn’t be too happy with that sort of coaching,’ she said quietly, making sure none of our teammates could hear her.
In any other situation I would have almost laughed at the look on Justine’s face. Instead, I took a deep breath and told her, ‘I don’t want to play state netball if I have to do things like that.’
‘Me either,’ said Tess, looking as fierce as ever.
Justine sort of crumbled. She went bright red, and was clearly really embarrassed. ‘I’m sorry. You’re right. I just wanted to beat them. I swear it won’t happen again,’ she said.
‘Okay,’ I told her, not wanting things to be too weird at training on Monday. Hopefully we could all forget this.
As we walked off, Tess squeezed my hand. ‘It wasn’t really your fault that she landed badly. You didn’t push her and you didn’t trip her. You might have bumped her, but players do that all the time. That’s just trying to win the ball.’
I smiled at Tess’s reasoning. I knew she was trying to make me feel better, and it was definitely helping. But I still wanted to apologise to the other player.
As I looked over to see if the girl was still on the bench, my stomach dropped. She had a doctor with her. And that doctor was my mum. Great. Trust my mum to jump in and start helping out the other team!
Mum was kneeling down, strapping the girl’s leg, when Tess and I walked up.
‘Edie! I was just explaining to Emma here that you’re my daughter.’
Emma looked up at me. I tried to work out if she
was angry, but I couldn’t really tell.
‘You okay?’ I asked.
There was a pause, then Mum answered for her. ‘She’ll be out for at least a month.’
Emma looked teary, and I felt even worse. ‘I’m sorry. I feel really awful that I made you land like that,’ I said, even though Tess was elbowing me, trying to make me stop talking. I think she was worried I’d get Justine in trouble, but I wasn’t that stupid.
‘It’s not your fault. Not really. I probably shouldn’t have been playing on it anyway,’ said Emma.
‘Still, I’m sorry.’
I realised Mum was watching me strangely. It was like she knew something had happened on the court, even if she wasn’t sure exactly what. ‘I keep telling you girls that netball is bad for your joints,’ she said, making Tess and I groan. ‘Not now, Mum!’
She laughed. ‘Okay, fair enough.’
Then Emma straightened up. ‘Thanks for missing that last goal. I’d heard you were a gun of a shooter. You must have been having an off day,’ she said, staring at me with a smile. I smiled back.
‘I’ll make sure I’m better for the finals,’ she continued. ‘We can do it all again.’ She held her hand out for me to shake.
I shook her hand. ‘I look forward to it.’
‘I’ll see you at home, honey,’ said Mum, as Tess and I headed off to join the others.
‘You know what, I reckon after today Justine will never hassle us about anything again!’ laughed Tess.
‘She’s probably terrified of you!’ I said.
‘She should be!’ She grinned, linking her arm through mine. ‘Chocolate cake?’
‘I thought you’d never ask!’
‘Bench me then,’ I said, pulling off my bib and handing it to Justine. ‘I’m not playing like that.’
‘Fine,’ said Justine, yanking the bib out of my hand and passing it to Poppy. Even though only seven players were needed on court, each state netball team had several extra players. That way, if someone was injured, another player could step in.
I watched Justine talk to Poppy, wondering if she’d ask her to target the GD too, or if she’d realised it wasn’t okay.
‘Edie? Are you sick?’ asked Tess, looking concerned.
But before I could answer her, Justine yelled for the team to get back on the court. The siren had gone and the game was starting.
Tess kept looking over at me, but there was no way I could explain what had happened while she was on the court. Besides, I didn’t want to wreck the game for her – although that was fast happening anyway. The Warriors had stormed ahead, and their GD was shutting down any attempt our attackers made to get the ball. I knew Tess was frustrated, and I hoped she’d understand why I’d refused to target their player. I didn’t want her to blame me if we lost, which was looking pretty likely at this stage. For a second I wondered if I’d done the right thing. Without their GD we might have stood a chance. I shook the thought off. I didn’t want to be responsible for injuring someone.
By the time the siren went at half-time, we were three goals down. I felt weird sitting on the bench as the rest of the team came into the huddle. Tess called me over to join in, but I shook my head. I didn’t want to have to explain myself to the rest of the team.
As the game started again, I tried to work out what the Warriors’ plays were. They positioned themselves differently to us, and moved the ball down the court in a slightly unusual way. I figured the reason they kept winning was because nobody had quite worked out how to shut them down. I noticed that their Wing Attack always seemed to run to the same spot. If we could just beat her there, they’d be down a player. I really wished that I was still on the court. I hated sitting here, watching my team get beaten.
The netball fairy must have heard me. Meg, our Wing Defence, leapt up to intercept a pass and she crashed down heavily. Her knee bent backwards. Even from the bench I could tell it was bad. She screamed as she hit the ground, and the umpire blew the whistle to stop the game as everyone surrounded her to see if she was okay. I wanted to run on too, but I couldn’t. Not from the bench.
I watched Justine and Tess lift her up and support her as she hopped from the court, crying. She couldn’t put any weight on her right leg. I really hoped she hadn’t torn a ligament or something.
‘Edie, you’re on,’ yelled Justine, tossing me the WD bib as she helped Meg to the bench.
I pulled a face. ‘I can’t play Wing Defence.’
‘Well, you’re not playing Goal Attack, and we need you,’ said Justine harshly.
I pulled on the bib. As I ran out onto the court, Tess grabbed my arm. ‘What is going on?’
‘I’ll tell you later.’
She nodded. ‘Hope you’ve got a plan. We’re getting thrashed!’
A plan? Hardly. I hadn’t played this position since I was ten. I might have been a natural attacker, but I certainly wasn’t a natural defender.
The whistle went and the game was back on. My WA was fast and pushy. Having seen the way she always ran to the same side of the goal circle, my only thought was to get there first and intercept. The first time I tried it, she had the ball away before I had any chance of grabbing it, and they scored a goal. They were now four goals up. We were in real trouble.
On their centre pass, I ran out fast. I knew exactly where she was going – I guess that was the advantage of watching from the bench. I’d started to read the play differently. I knocked the pass away and Maggie snatched it up. A quick pass back to me and I lobbed it long to Tess in the circle. It was a crazy pass, but I knew Tess could catch it. She did, and she scored. Now we were three down.
I realised I was trying to play attack from a defensive position, which was risky. I had to try and defend as well. Besides, I had a lot to prove to Justine. I needed to show her we could win without targeting injured players.
As I chased the WA down the court, I waited a split second for their Centre to pass the ball off and then I leapt in front, snatching it away. I threw the ball to Maggie, and she passed it to Becky, our Centre. Becky passed to Tess, who promptly shot another goal. Two down.
As I jogged back for the centre pass, I saw Justine watching me. She nodded and shrugged, which I gathered was some sort of weird apology. I knew we’d have to talk about what happened later, but right now, I was going to smash this game as hard as I could.
On our next centre pass, I came right out, freeing Poppy up to run into the goal third. It was a messy play, but it was effective, and Tess scored another goal. I could feel the charge of our team as we began to realise we could actually win. Suddenly everyone lifted. Maggie threw a beautiful lob to Tess, which she caught just inside the circle. And from there she shot a perfect goal. The scores were level. This game was ours.
With only a minute to go, Justine started yelling from the sidelines. Even she could feel it. I knew we had to convert their next centre pass. As the whistle went, I sprung out like I was being chased. Our defence was so good, the Warriors had no one to pass to, and the umpire blew her whistle. They’d held the ball for more than three seconds, so it was ours. I took the pass and threw it fast to Maggie, who then bounce-passed to Tess. I expected Tess to take a shot, but instead she threw a sneaky short pass to Poppy, who’d replaced me in Goal Attack. Poppy shot a beautiful goal, putting us in front by one.
We’d just jogged back to the line when the siren sounded. We’d won the game.
I heard the cheers from the crowd as our team huddled close, and sang our team song. We were all beaming. Even Justine broke into the huddle and joined in. She caught my eye, smiled, and mouthed,‘I’m sorry.’ I just nodded. I knew there would be a proper chat, but now wasn’t the
time. We’d just beaten the top team – and we’d done it without targeting anyone.
Tess handed out the jelly snakes. I grabbed an extra one and walked over to the bench, where Meg was having her knee strapped – by my mum. She must have seen what had happened and run down to help out.
‘Nice game, honey,’ said Mum, looking up from where she was tying off the bandage.
‘Thanks,’ I said, handing Meg a jelly snake. ‘You okay?’ She nodded. ‘Your Mum says it’s not too bad. A couple of weeks maybe, and I’ll be back.’
‘Good, because Wing Defence is one hard position. We need you!’ I said, not wanting her to think that just because we’d won, she wasn’t needed. She smiled at me. ‘You did okay in it. Amazing game, Edie.’
‘Yeah, I had a point to make.’
Tess had joined us while we were talking, and I could feel her looking at me strangely. But before I could explain anything to her, I heard someone calling my name. I looked around and saw a cute, grinning face beaming down at me from the stand. It was Finn. I looked at Tess, who gave me a huge smile. ‘Go. Your fan awaits!’ I certainly didn’t need to be told twice. After all the craziness of the game, talking to Finn seemed like the best way I could possibly celebrate.
Besides, he really was cute. And I was pretty sure he didn’t train on Thursdays, and neither did I, so maybe … just maybe … we could finally find an hour or two to hang out.
Play the Game
published in 2014 by
Hardie Grant Egmont
Ground Floor, Building 1, 658 Church Street
Richmond, Victoria 3121, Australia
www.hardiegrantegmont.com.au
This ebook is also available as a print edition in all good bookstores.
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