Netball World Cup; Meet the female Head Coaches

This years Netball World Cup sees 16 Countries from around the World compete for the 15th edition of the Netball World Cup.  Out of the 16 countries, 12 of them have female head coaches, making it 75% female, 25% male.Below, we have done our best to bring you some info about each of the female head coaches:

Australia – Lisa Alexander

Lisa Alexander is an Australian netball coach. In 2011, she was named as head coach of the Australia national netball team, succeeding Norma Plummer.

Alexander is a former Victorian state representative player and a member of the Australian senior wider squad. She was head coach of the Melbourne Phoenix in the Commonwealth Bank Trophy, taking the team to two title wins in 2002 and 2003. She was appointed head coach of the Australian U21 netball team from 2006–07. With the start of the ANZ Championship in 2008, Alexander was appointed assistant coach of the Adelaide Thunderbirds, under head coach Jane Woodlands-Thompson. The Thunderbirds won the ANZ Championship title in 2009. That year she was also an assistant coach for the World VII team.

On 11 August 2011, Lisa Alexander was named as the head coach of the Australia national netball team. She took over the position from Norma Plummer, who stepped down after the 2011 World Netball Championships to coach the West Coast Fever in the ANZ Championship from 2012.

On 30 July 2000, she was awarded the Australian Sports Medal for services to netball as a player and in the area of coaching and player development.  She was awarded the AIS Sport Performance Awards Coach of the Year for 2014.

SOURCE: Wikipedia 


Barbados – Anna Shepherd


England – Tracey Neville

Since retiring, Neville has been dedicated to raising the profile of netball throughout the country and also took up coaching. She runs the Tracey Neville Netball Academy at Sedbergh School during summer term break and personally coaches young girls interested in the game. In January 2011, Neville was named coach of Team Northumbria.  October 2011 she was appointed director of netball at Manchester-based Superleague club Manchester Thunder. In March 2015 Neville was appointed interim coach of the England netball team. The appointment was made permanent in September 2015.  At the 2018 Commonwealth Games, at the Gold Coast in Australia, she coached England to win the gold medal, which was England’s first ever netball gold medal

SOURCE: Wikipedia


FIJI – Vicki Wilson

Wilson was a part of the Australian national netball team for fifteen years, making her debut in 1985. Wilson became captain of the Australian netball team in 1996, while on the comeback trail from a knee injury sustained at the 1995 Netball World Championships. In 1998 she led the Australian team to the first ever netball gold medal at the Commonwealth Games and in 1999 she retired on a winning note, after leading Australia to a one-point win in the World Championship final.

Wilson was called up to coach the Queensland Firebirds in 2006, after consistent lacklustre performances in the Commonwealth Bank Trophy. She continued with the franchise in the ANZ Championship, but was stood down from the position by Netball Queensland after the 2009 season.

In May 2013, Wilson was named as the new assistant coach for the New Zealand Silver Ferns until the end of 2015.

In June 2016, she signed to coach the Netball Fiji side for three years.

SOURCE: Wikipedia 


Jamaica – Marvette Anderson


New Zealand – Noeline Taurua

Noeline Taurua is a former New Zealand international netball representative, who played in the Silver Fernsteam that won a silver medal at the 1998 Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur. She is current head coach of the Sunshine Coast Lightning in the National Netball League. Prior to her appointment, she coached the Southern Steel in the ANZ Championship.

During her career, Taurua held assistant coaching positions for the Silver Ferns and head coaching positions for Waikato/Bay of Plenty Magic.

In 2011, Taurua acted as unofficial assistant coach to the Silver Ferns alongside Ruth Aitken 

In 2012, Taurua accepted an official position as Silver Ferns assistant coach after being offered the role several times.  Taurua coached the Waikato/Bay of Plenty Magic to their first ANZ Championship title.

In 2013, Taurua decided to finish her coaching duties for the Silver Ferns after performing in the role for 1.5 seasons for family reasons  and from Waikato/Bay of Plenty Magic after spending 11 years at the franchise. Taurua’s replacement at Waikato/Bay of Plenty Magic will be the former Swifts coach Julie Fitzgerald.

After the dissolution of the ANZ Championship at the end of July 2016, the Sunshine Coast Lightningannounced the signing of Taurua heading into the 2017 of the National Netball League. Taurua coached the Lightning to back-to-back premierships in the new competition, before being selected as the head coach of the New Zealand national netball team in August 2018.  As well as being the national team coach, Taurua continues to coach the Lightning in Australia.

SOURCE: Wikipedia


Samoa – Marcia Hardcastle


Scotland – Gail Parata

Gail Parata is the New Zealand born Head Coach to the Scottish Netball Team. Since 2013, Gail has taken them to a top 10 World Ranking, a Commonwealth Games, a World Cup and a Tour of South Africa…all this from a girl who was unable to get onto her High School A Team!

The retired Silver Ferns player has worked with the Worlds best, from Waimarama Taumaunu to Margaret Matenga and credits her success to working hard, dreaming big and never giving up.


Singapore – Natalie Milicich

Milicich, a mother of four, was most recently the high performance manager and head coach of New Zealand’s Netball Central Zone, the champion for Beko National League last June. The league sits just below the ANZ Premiership, which is the premier domestic league in New Zealand.
The newly appointed coach has administered the development and successful implementation of various programmes, including Auckland Netball’s High Performance programme and Zone Player Development Plan, working closely with many other netball coaches and team managers. Also a former Director of Sport at Carmel College, Milicich has coached National Provincial Championships and a broad range of representative age groups and schools.
SOURCE: Wikipedia

South Africa – Norma Plummer

After several years as coach of the national youth team, and having been rumoured for the head national coach position since the late 1980s, Plummer was the obvious favourite when Jill McIntosh resigned in July 2003, and subsequently took the reins of the national team in late August.  In her nearly three years as coach for the Australian team, she has retained her prior reputation as a hard coach willing to axe even star players if not performing, and remains widely respected, even with a downturn in the team’s fortunes during 2005.

In June 2006 after the silver medal in March at the Commonwealth Games Norma Plummer led her young team to victory in all Test Match Series in 2006 & 2007 and in November 2007 won the World Championships in Auckland, New Zealand.

In 2008 Plummer’s team Australian Diamonds, had beaten Silver Ferns 53 to 51 at the Horncastle Arena and two years later won a gold medal at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in New Delhi.  She also coached Australian national team at the 2011 Netball World Championships in Singapore.

Norma has announced that she will be coaching the West Coast Fever for season 2012.

In June 2015 Plummer became the head coach of the South Africa national netball team.

During the 2013 Australia Day honours, Plummer was appointed a Member in the General Division of the Order of Austalia.

In 2014, after a 66-65 loss by her team West Coast Fever, which was playing at in Dunedin at that time, a resident of the city had made death threats towards her on her personal webpage.

In 2018 Plummer had revealed that although she doesn’t have a signed contract with the Netball South Africa, she will lead its national team to greatness at the upcoming 2019 Netball World Cup in Liverpool

SOURCE: Wikipedia


Sri Lanka – Thilaka Jinadasa


Zimbabwe – Ledwin Dondo


Male coaches:

Malawi – Whyte Millima (Male)
Northern Ireland – Dan Ryan (Male)
Trinidad – Wesley Gomez (Male)
Uganada – Rashid Mubiru (Male)