Former Aussie coach has a dream
By JIM KAYES

Jill McIntosh calls it the first step. Netball has tiptoed into the world of professional sport with the inaugural ANZ Championship, but McIntosh wants more.

In her version of The Field of Dreams, the former Australia national coach wants to see a fully professional competition - the trans-Tasman competition is only semi-professional.

Her dream also includes an international sponsor and an elite competition that features the top six nations.

"This is a beginning," McIntosh says of the ANZ Championship.
"It's been a long time coming and the money is better than before, but we are still nowhere in the league of male sports."

McIntosh also concedes that, outside New Zealand netball, has an image problem, or more correctly a lack of image problem.

Even in Australia, where the test team has been a dominant force for, well, it seems like forever, the sport receives almost no recognition.

One step toward correcting that would be a better international calendar.
"We're in the Commonwealth Games and every four years we have our world champs, but we need an international competition to give the top six countries more exposure."

McIntosh has been coming to Wellington for the past four years to help coach the region's coaches.

It has been the theme of her life since she retired as Australia coach at the end of 2003, having taken them to two world titles and two more Commonwealth Games gold medals during her nine years at the helm.

In the past five years she has helped in Jamaica, Singapore, Canada, South Africa, Papua New Guinea, Barbados, the Maldives and Sri Lanka.

When it's noted that New Zealand is missing from that list, McIntosh smiles in a way that lets you know the suggestion is silly, if not outright stupid.
"I don't think so," she says, with a chuckle.

"It's wonderful here in Wellington but I don't think I could go to that level [and help coach the Silver Ferns].

"And they don't need me. The Silver Ferns are doing fine as they are, thank you."

One of the concerns about the new trans-Tasman competition is that New Zealand's and Australia's dominance will simply become more entrenched.
McIntosh says that's not their fault. "It's for the rest of the world to catch up.
"When I coached Australia we had a period of success and people would say, `Oh, you just keep winning, that's not good for the game'.

"Well, it's not Australia or New Zealand's fault that they will get better. It's for them to set the standard and the rest of the world to try and catch up.
"They have to get off their backsides and set up competitions like a European league."

McIntosh is confident the talent is there - her only concern is whether the money can be found to develop the players.

"Jamaica, they are one country that, given the opportunity, could do anything. When you go to Jamaica and you see what they don't have, you just think, `Wow'. If you put them into Australia or New Zealand, where they have the best of everything, those athletes could do anything."