Niamh McCall admits Strathclyde Sirens were taught some tough lessons in last season’s Vitality Netball Superleague, but hopes they all learned from the experience.
McCall, 22, from Strathaven, intends to use all the experiences she has gained – including from this summer’s Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games – and put it into good use next season.
But McCall reckons Sirens didn’t progress enough from a previous season that saw them miss out on a play-off place by a whisker, as they finished eighth in the 11-team league.
That still qualifies Sirens for the Fast5 tournament this summer, but McCall reckons they could have done better.
She said: “It was a difficult season. Going from everyone travelling to a centralised venue in the previous season to then going back to all different venues was difficult for everyone.
“From a performance perspective, it was definitely not what we wanted.
“It gave us tough games and it gave us that experience that, yeah, you’re going to have to work as hard as you can, that people are not going to hand the win to you.
“There’s always extra pressure to try and back up your last season, so there was a bit of extra pressure to an extent, but we weren’t really focusing on that, it was just our own performances.
“Every team is not going to stay the same from season to season, so we just didn’t back it up.”
McCall says it’s important to utilise that next season, but says expectation on Sirens will be wiped out after their most recent campaign.
She said: “It’s a clean slate, we can play our own game. I think each season you have to do that.
“Teams will change, it will be a new team – whoever we have – and it will be exciting.”
McCall is one of several Sirens stars who are competing for Scottish Thistles at Birmingham 2022, and reckons that will help as well.
“Any experience you can gain from a game helps, and hopefully I can bring that to Sirens next season,” she said.
“Having two different coaches means you get double the information, so it’s great if you can try to combine that and bring the best performance that you can.”
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