'Ten days in Lionesses' den and I wanted to stay forever'
Liv Tchine's first impression was "wow".
Her second was "can I stay here forever?".
Her third was "one day this will be all ours".
Netball's kingdom is modest, but prolific England goal shooter Tchine and her team-mates recently had a glimpse of a top-tier sporting promised land.
These are the Roses players targeting Commonwealth Games gold at Glasgow 2026 and World Cup glory in 2027.
They are at the vanguard of the sport's professional era, the elite of the three million people who play netball in England at least once a year. Most players are women, but men play too.
Tchine and co draw inspiration from the Euros-winning Lionesses and World Cup-winning Red Roses, rather than lament encroachment on netball's legacy territory.
Netball Super League is newly professional but funds are tight, similar to football's Women's Super League in the mid-2010s.
Players hear of rewards that could be theirs one day. Often those rewards feel a million miles away, yet not always.
For Tchine, a standout in the London Pulse side who swept to their first Super League title this year, the "wow" moment came at the Lionesses' luxury hangout.
St George's Park lies in Derbyshire countryside, tucked out of sight. An understated private drive off a hedge-lined B road is a portal to a world beyond the dreams of most sportspeople.
"Just imagine netball having this kind of facility. Do you know how sick that would be?"
That was Tchine on an Instagram video diary, reacting to visiting the Football Association's state-of-the-art national team training centre for the first time. The gym, the recovery rooms, the green, green grass of England's home.
England's netballers spent a training block there, before autumn series against Jamaica and New Zealand.
"I was like, if we could just stay here forever, I would happily move," Tchine tells BBC Sport.
"So, so good. We were there for 10 days. The facilities were, honestly, so amazing.
"The whole time we were there I was just like, one day netball could definitely have something like this."
The second season since Super League's relaunch is coming, with 2026 fixtures announced this week., external
Pulse are in "the best position we've ever been in", Tchine says.
The league is growing. Average attendances climbed by 42% in 2025, having been about 1,500 previously. In comparison, the first Women's Super League football season - following a 2014 reboot - had average crowds of 728 (from 562 in 2013).
Women's football crowds in the tens of thousands are now almost commonplace, but that didn't happen overnight.
Tchine, a 24-year-old south Londoner, admired portraits of England footballers - men and women - lining St George's Park's corridors.
"I definitely hope that if I'm still playing in 10 years we'll be at the same level as the Lionesses and the Red Roses," she says.
"They were both absolutely incredible this summer - going out there, doing their job and coming out with wins was amazing. It's really good to see women's sport hitting levels that it's never been at in the past.
"I want to be able to go out with the Roses and use that momentum to try and get our gold medal."
Netball England trumpets participation numbers, but football, rugby and cricket are also appealing to women and girls.
Sport England figures, published by The Times, external in November 2024, indicated more girls aged under 18 in 2022-23 played football (16%) than netball (15.4%).
That marks a shift in five years, with football rising by 2% and netball static.
When the effect of the Lionesses' Euros triumph in 2022 became apparent, England Netball chief executive Fran Connolly warned a parliamentary committee that any "disproportionate focus on growing football... will have a detrimental effect on other women's sports, particularly those that do not have the financial underpinning of a male counterpart".
Baroness Sue Campbell, who successfully advocated for more female participation while serving as the FA's director of women's football, is now England Netball's chair.
Big moments matter. YouGov figures showed 130,700 women started playing netball, or played more often, within months of England winning gold at the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Australia.
A repeat in Glasgow would be timely.
Cardiff Dragons become simply Dragons. They will play in Liverpool as well as the Welsh capital.
Games will be played for the first time at the National Cycling Centre in Manchester and Essex Sports Arena.
Wembley Arena will stage a London derby when Mavericks host Pulse in May.
Manchester Thunder have brought England star Eleanor Cardwell back from Australia, where she was MVP in Adelaide's 2023 Grand Final win.
21 February: Super Cup, Sheffield Arena
27 February: Netball Super League begins
Opening fixtures:
27 February: London Pulse v Manchester Thunder
28 February: London Mavericks v Nottingham Forest, Loughborough Lightning v Dragons, Birmingham Panthers v Leeds Rhinos
20 June: Grand Final, venue tbc
BBC
