'Not good enough': Caroline Wilson rips Collingwood for 'abandoning' its netball team
Caroline Wilson has slammed Collingwood's handling of its Super Netball team.
Last week, news broke that Collingwood was conducting a review into its Super Netball program, seemingly weighing up its place in the competition on account of financial issues.
"Collingwood has done a lot of things right this year, but abandoning, as it might do, its netball team after seven years is not one of them," Wilson told Nine's Footy Classified.
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"With just five weeks to go in the season and no women's pay deal in place, Collingwood decide that it all might be a bit too hard, a bit too expensive and Netball Australia a bit too poorly run to stick around."
Collingwood ruckman Mason Cox and former Magpies' netballer Erin Bell in 2017. Scott Barbour via Getty Images
The Collingwood Football Club launched its netball franchise in 2017 as one of three new teams to join the Super Netball league ahead of its inaugural season.
Despite fielding a star-studded list, the team has so far failed to live up to its potential.
After seven seasons, the team has featured in the finals series on only two occasions and currently resides at the bottom of the ladder with just two wins this year.
Upon its inception, the Collingwood Football Club and Netball Australia formed a partnership with the Tasmanian government. This included an investment of $1.65 million alone in the first three years.
Following reports the Magpies are on the brink of collapse, Wilson said the club owed a lot to their women's sports programs and female athletes.
"Collingwood won significant public funding from a government enamoured by women's sporting programs as a result of their netball team and then [women's] football team," she said.
"[The club's] got bigger, brighter facilities for them to thank."
The review comes at a worrying time for Collingwood's netballers and staff with no players from any of the Super Netball teams being contracted beyond this season with a Collective Players' Agreement from Netball Australia yet to be agreed beyond September 2023.
Anzac Day commemorations are observed during the round six Super Netball match between Collingwood Magpies and Sunshine Coast Lightning. Kelly Defina
"Now, placing careers in jeopardy and an eight-team competition. This is poor by Collingwood," Wilson said.
Aligned with one of the biggest professional sporting clubs in Australia, Wilson believed the team should be valued more highly within the club's broader sports program.
Last November, the club revealed its 2022 financial results with a net profit of $7,134,753.
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On top of this, in February The Age reported that Collingwood would receive the base distribution of funding - of between $10.5 million and $11 million - from the AFL in 2023.
"It costs less than $3 million to run a netball team and Collingwood is one of the richest clubs in the land," Wilson said.
"Not good enough."
Last week, Netball Australia CEO Kelly Ryan stated that despite the situation unfolding with Collingwood, the governing body is committed to an eight-team Super Netball competition in 2024.
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