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It is a frontier year for netball in Western Australia.
The Fever is dealing with higher expectations after a grand final appearance last year, a permanent move to Perth Arena and a new lucrative sponsorship deal that is worth a record $5 million to WA netball over the next three years.
The sport is now in rarefied air, and it has been a progression built on years of hard work.
As the Fever won its way to a maiden grand final berth it became the main show in town — crowds were big, media attention was high and community interest in the Perth team peaked.
The grand final against Sunshine Coast last year was watched by more than 1 million people across Australia, and the club's 16 games over the season were streamed by more than 1 million people.
The Fever also did 170 media appearances in the week leading up to the decider.
Netball top team sport for girls
Across the league, more than 6.7 million viewers tuned in to at least part of a match in 2018, with a match average of 140,000 viewers — an increase of 25.9 per cent on the year before.
With those sorts of figures, it is no wonder the Fever has just signed the biggest sponsorship deal in the history of women's sport in WA.
The game also remains strong at grassroots level.
According to the Australian Sports Commission, netball remained the number one team sport for girls last year despite Australian football, cricket, soccer and rugby all making concerted efforts to increase the number of females playing their respective sports.
Swimming was still the overall favourite, accounting for 33.9 per cent of girls aged 0-14, with netball at 13.3 per cent.
Dancing, gymnastics, football, basketball, dance sports, athletics, tennis and hockey rounded out the top 10.
A total of 1.2 million people play netball in Australia, and 230,000 of those are in WA.
Nielsen Sports said more than one in five Australians are fans or consumers of netball — and that is something which makes it even more appealing for broadcasters, according to media analyst Steve Allan.
"One of the things about netball is it has a very attractive demographic from a telecaster's point of view," he said.
"It is nearly all 14 to 34[-year-old] females. That is a very attractive group."
'The sport has moved to new heights'
Netball Australia has formed an independent commission ahead of this year's Super Netball season, following the framework set out by leagues such as the AFL and NRL, with the aim of being the top sporting league for women globally.
Sport Australia CEO Kate Palmer said it was another big step in the right direction.
"I think this is the next iteration of the sport in this country, and certainly under the [Netball Australia] leadership of [CEO] Marne Fechner and [chair] Paolina Hunt, the sport has moved to new heights," she said.
"We have seen this in other sports — once you move to an independent commission, you get different levels of expertise in this space."
In an increasingly crowded sporting market, netball is stronger than it has ever been.
Topics: netball, sport, perth-6000, wa