How do rotate a netball team of 10?<br />

Tina FlightCoach, New Zealand

I have been in this situation many times over tournaments and also just during a standard season. A good thing to do is train your players to work in a combination. Eg. Have two combinations of C/WA/WD. They then either alternate quarters or half games or have one player that is always part of the combination on the court. If you have a multitude of midcourters or a shooting combination or defence combination this can work well. It can rest players and also make them hungry to do well when they are on the court. It allows for the players to learn how to work with particular players well and build up a good understanding of each others play to make this strategy work.

Netball CoachCoach

I am also in this situation with the team I coach and found it extremely difficult to give everyone equal court time last season. For the new season I have now gone to a roster system where one player gets a bye each week. However that person still has to show up to the game in full uniform in case of injury, and to still support the rest of the team. We discussed doing this with the team before implementing it, but they all liked the idea very much. Now it works out that One player has a bye, One player gets a full game and the others get 3 quarters. Then the next game the player that had a Bye gets the Full game. Hope this helps...Good Luck!!

CarolineCoach, Australia

we have twelve in our team. 11 year olds. We rotate two girls off each week (they don't have to come to the games). For the remaining 10%3A 8 girls play three quarters each; two girls (usually sharing the C bib) get 1/2 a game each. Most of the girls play two positions - such as GS / GA or WD / WA or GD / GK. It is quite a challenge but that works - if your objective is to give everyone equal court time it is about the only way it can work.

Ross PattersonCoach, Australia

Here are a few ideas that may help with balancing court time.

7 Players

Same Goalers & Defenders

8 Players

Goalers & Defenders Swap

9 Players

Same Goalers & Defenders

10 Players

WA & WD off for ½

5 Players

All Swap

6 Players

All swap

7 Players

All swap

8 Players

All swap

9 Players

All swap

EstherCoach, Australia

This is how I rotate my team of 9 and it could work for 10 as well. I make sure that no players who play the same position are next to each other so I don't have the same positions off at the same time (I have 3 middle court, 3 shooters and 3 defence) then give them each a number from one to nine (or in this case 1-10). For the first quarter 1-3 would sit off, 4-6 would sit off in the second quarter and so on all the way back to 10, 1 and 2 sitting off in the last quarter. With 10 players, numbers 1 and 2 would have to sit off twice in one game but then in the next game, the rotation would start with 3,4 and 5, so that week it would be 3 and 4's turn to sit off twice.

With my team of 9, two players sit off each quarter with one lucky player getting to stay on for the whole game (number 9 in the first game). But the next time, 9 and 1 would sit off first and number 8 gets to stay on a whole game. My girls are all happy with this arrangement (but it might pay to write down their order particularly with younger players and jot down what number your rotation finished on to minimise confusion.)