League names top netball players

THE top performing athletes in the Central Highlands Netball League season were celebrated as part of an awards night at the Ballarat and District Trotting Club in Redan on Wednesday last week.

There the season’s best and fairest were announced across the league’s 17 registered clubs.

Rokewood coach and A Grade player Kate O’Meara took home the category’s top spot with 26 votes.

She said it’s an “honouring” team effort for the club to take home the win.

“Hopefully this recognises the consistency of my game this year,” she said. “Myself and Libby [Denouden] took on co-coaching this year.

“It’s probably the first time this season I’ve taken on less of an individual focus and more of a team-based one. This probably defines the great family culture we’ve got out there.

“We made it to the prelim but lost to Learmonth. Some success we saw is that we were able to recruit more A Grade players this year which saw the squad expand to 11 players.”

O’Meara’s win was followed by fellow Rokewood A Grade player and coach Elizabeth Denouden, who followed her with one vote behind.

Emily Findlay from Learmonth won the B Grade’s best and fairest with 32 votes while Clunes’ Alannah Trevisan was runner-up with 22 votes.

Gordon’s Vanessa Carton brought home the C Grade win with 30 votes while Milly McPherson from Buninyong followed with six votes behind.

D Grade’s best and fairest was tied with Learmonth’s Jaime Gigliotti and Rokewood’s Eleanor Williams both receiving 18 votes.

Bree Lewis from Clunes was runner-up to the pair with 15 votes.

The 2023 Central Highlands Netball League Team of the Year was also announced which included three players from Learmonth as well as the club’s Jordan O’Keefe as coach.