“I’m a massive netball geek.” 

So says Liz Wroe, the relatively new chair of Cirencester Netball Club, who is as passionate about the game now as she was when she first played the sport at the age of nine more than 30 years ago. 

Now 44, the mum of two young daughters reckons she spends some 15 or more hours a week devoted to netball, whether it be playing, training, watching matches or in her new role at Cirencester. 

“I watch all the international games on TV,” she said. “And I watch all the club games live. I support Melbourne Vixens and Leeds Rhinos but I do have a soft spot for local teams Team Bath and Severn Stars.” 

Liz is originally from Yorkshire, hence her love of Leeds, and she lived in Australia for eight years – her husband Peter is from Down Under – before moving to this part of the world some five years ago.

They now live in Fairford, but when they first moved to Gloucestershire they lived in Cirencester and Liz, a lawyer, is extremely pleased they did.

“I joined Cirencester because they were the local club to me,” she said. “It’s the luck of the draw. I’ve played for quite a few clubs and Cirencester are a very good club, they are very friendly.

“A lot of sports clubs can have different cliques but that’s not the case at Cirencester.”

And while there is clearly a good buzz around the place – you’d expect that when you take into account their thriving youth section – the global pandemic has brought with it plenty of problems.

“It’s had a huge impact on all grassroots sport,” admitted Liz. “We’ve lost quite a lot of players. Some have decided to take a permanent break from the game while others have simply found other things to do.

“We used to have three teams in the County League but now we have just the two, although we are rebuilding.

“The first team play in Division One and the second team play in Division Four and it’s fantastic that we’ve got those two teams.

“Both are a mixture of adult players in their 30s and 40s and younger players coming through.”

And it’s those younger players who are the lifeblood of the club, as indeed they are pretty much of any club, of course, and at Cirencester there is a clear pathway into the adult game.

The club run teams at under 16, 14, 13 and 12 age groups, as well as combined training groups for years 4 and 5, and a training group for year 6.

“The youth section is the club’s strongest feature,” said Liz. “We’ve got a very good feeder system.

“All our coaches are Level 2 qualified and all our assistant coaches are either Level 1 qualified or working towards it. The Level 1 coaches are predominantly under-18s or under-16s who we’re supporting through either coaching or umpiring pathways. Sara Jones is Youth Coach Lead and she coaches and plays too. She does a huge amount for the club.

“Our year 4 and 5 combined sessions started in September with approximately five players and now have easily over 15. Our year 6 group is fully subscribed while our under-12 teams are embarking on their first competitive season.”

They have teams in Division One and Division Two of the County Youth League, which is the same as the under-13s and under-14s.

The club have four teams at under-16 level, one in Division One and three in Division Two.

The under-13s are coached by Liz’s predecessor as chair, Jemma Last, someone who has done so much for the club over the years.

She held the top job at the club for five years and Liz said: “She’s fantastic. I only agreed to take on the position of chair if she stayed on the committee.

“She’s our membership secretary as well as a youth coach and she has a huge amount of knowledge about the club.”

Liz says she can often spend up to 10 hours a week on club business, which doesn’t include two hours a week training and three hours travelling and playing matches on Saturdays.

No wonder she says with a laugh when asked how much of her time netball takes up each week, “a lot of hours,” before adding, “fortunately there is not too much netball on television at the moment!”

Covid has made the job of chair more time consuming, of course, but happily Liz has not lost any of her enthusiasm for simply playing the sport.

She remains very competitive, so much so that she gets her daughters to help her train.

“I’ve got a netball post and Jennifer, my seven-year-old, will pass the ball to me,” she said. “I’m a shooter and she’s my wing attack.”

Liz’s youngest, Lucy, is still at nursery, but she gets involved too and it surely won’t be too long before both are playing netball at Cirencester.

Liz wants to carry on playing until her mid-50s so there’s a good chance that they could all end up on the same court together one day.

“I hope so, that would be brilliant, although they probably won’t think so,” laughed Liz.