Third time’s a charm for Peta Toeava, returning to the Silver Ferns to play Australia's Diamonds this week, and wanting to show a new dimension to her ingenious game.
Peta Toeava is learning to be patient in her third chapter with the Silver Ferns.
New Zealand netball’s undisputed queen of flair, Toeava is working to introduce different skills to her always-creative game to make the step up in international netball – and this time, stay there.
Under the guidance of Dame Noeline Taurua, the 28-year-old wing attack is learning to play a shorter, sharper, more clinical game, before she picks the right time to switch it up to her legendary no-look passes and long pinpoint lobs to the Silver Ferns shooters – in particular, her Mystics team-mate Grace Nweke.
Toeava’s hoping to test the new dimension to her game against the world’s current No.1 side, the Australian Diamonds, in this week’s New Zealand leg of the Constellation Cup.
“A massive thing Noels wants is for us to be more clinical, to have better ball retention, and know when that ball can go in, or when we need to do the work outside,” Toeava says.
“We need to do the hard work first – playing it short, playing to the circle edge. Then once we’ve got that nailed, we can look long, because the space will open up eventually.
“That’s where I need to control the flair I bring into the game. And that’s something I really want to nail – definitely in this series, but also in the ANZ Premiership. It will be hard work, but that’s good for me.”
Toeava had previous chances to prove herself in the Silver Ferns in 2018 and 2021, but for a player whose signature game revolves around space, she found the cloying man-on marking many nations use testing. Taurua is impressed Toeava has taken her message on board.
“That’s the intention for all of us, to be able to wear the pressure until there’s a moment in time where we’ll open up and the uniqueness of each individual will come out,” the head coach says.
“It’s not something that you can predict. They’ll feel it when the time’s right. The player has to be confident in their skills and trust those around them.”
Taurua knows it isn’t easy for players at the top of their game to be flexible, but being open to change and learn as their careers progress is the key to longevity in the game.
“It takes courage, especially if you’ve been playing a certain way in the ANZ Premiership and you’re the best,” she says. “But in international netball, you’ve got to be open to change, open to be better, and have the ability to learn more. The intent in itself will get you to the next level.”
Taurua has given Toeava and fellow midcourter Kimiora Poi a unique opportunity in this Constellation Cup, where she’s named different teams to play on different sides of the Tasman.
Toeava and Mila Reuelu-Buchanan join the squad for the two New Zealand tests – in Auckland tomorrow night and Tauranga on Sunday. Poi, who has eight test caps, is called up alongside Maddy Gordon to travel with the Ferns to Melbourne and the Gold Coast next week.
With veteran midcourters Gina Crampton and Shannon Saunders unavailable for this crucial series, it opens up the opportunity for the young midcourters (including this season’s incumbents Whitney Souness and Kate Heffernan) to stake their claim.
“With the likes of Peta and Kimiora, they’ve been in and out of the Ferns, but you can really see the work they’ve done. It shows their passion and their commitment to wear the black dress,” Taurua says.
“Peta is definitely fit, well and ready. And I think she’s committed to the Silver Ferns but also to challenge herself.
“We’ve always kept her in the mix - sometimes it’s about timing and readiness. The thing with her as well, she’s still young. She can do another [World Cup] cycle. That's the exciting thing for a lot of them."
Taurua acknowledges in the past some players dropped from the New Zealand side fell out of the high performance system altogether. “Now we really want to make sure we keep building the depth and the base, and we don’t take people out of the system too early,” she says. “We’re all part of the system to be better for netball.”
Toeava appreciates the chance to work with Taurua and to prove herself again – especially with the 2023 Netball World Cup on the horizon.
“I was excited to get the call. I’m just happy to be given this opportunity to get back out on court and show what I’ve got,” she says.
“Noels is really good - she always says it how it is and comes up with new ideas. I feel like I’m still learning and she’s really helping me to develop my game.”
Following a challenging ANZ Premiership season in which she was nursing a thigh injury, Toeava has been focused purely on training, working with the Silver Ferns’ strength and conditioning coach, Guy Mothersole.
“It’s definitely one of my goals to make the World Cup team, so I just need to keep training hard and working on my skillset,” she says.
Toeava has never faced the Diamonds before – all three of her test caps have been against England's Roses. But she knows what to expect from her years playing in the old trans-Tasman ANZ Championship.
“I know it will be really physical man-on defence, and grinding. They won’t give up any space, so it will be really hard,” says Toeava.
She’s looking forward to playing alongside Souness for the first time – their combination could be a highlight of this series. And of course, to reconnecting with Nweke, with whom she now has an almost innate on-court understanding.
“It’s quite cool to have someone who’ve I’ve fed the whole year there. I feel really comfortable feeding Grace,” Toeava says. “But it will be a massive step up against Australia, so we’ll see how that goes.”
The Ferns and the Diamonds haven’t met in the Constellation Cup since early 2021, when New Zealand brought the silverware home for the first time in nine years. They didn’t come up against each other at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, where Australia won gold.
So this series, which Taurua rates as a pinnacle event up with the Comm Games and the World Cup, has three prongs of importance for the Silver Ferns.
“There’s a level of excitement we’re testing ourselves against the best,” Taurua says. “We have a new generation amongst our players who for the first time are playing Australia four tests in a row, and playing in Australia. It provides those players with international exposure they haven’t had.
“The second thing it does is gives us a key guideline as to how close we are to Australia. And it provides us with what the next stages need to be, knowing that we have the Netball World Cup in July.
“And the third thing is for our own confidence - not a measurement but knowing we are heading in the right direction. From this year’s Quad Series in January, we’ve moved to the Commonwealth Games, then moved to Cadbury Series against Jamaica, and we shift each time. This is another stepping-stone for us to move and be better.”
* The Silver Ferns play the Australian Diamonds in the first test of the Constellation Cup at Spark Arena in Auckland on Wednesday at 7.30pm - after the NZ Men play their Australian rivals at 5.30pm. Both games are live on Sky Sport 1.
