100 Years of NV | 2000s: Hometown Rivalry

One of the biggest hometown rivalries in the history of Australian women’s sport was that between the Melbourne Phoenix and the Melbourne Kestrels. The Commonwealth Bank sponsored a national competition that ran from 1997 to 2007, and it was the advent of this league that led to the creation of two Victorian teams: the Phoenix and the Kestrels.

While both teams operated under the umbrella of Netball Victoria, they followed vastly different paths. The Phoenix won the inaugural Commonwealth Bank Trophy and would go on to be the most successful team in the competition’s short history, winning five championships in all. The Kestrels, on the other hand, were the perennial ‘little sister’ to the more experienced Phoenix, and struggled to replicate the success of their local rivals.

While many will remember the players and the championship games they were involved in, it is likely that most will have forgotten the wide array of ephemera that surrounded the teams. The Edith Hull Collection holds a range of souvenirs and collectables of both teams, with the extensive memorabilia indicative of their friendly, but certainly genuine, rivalry. The evidence below will no doubt encourage some reminiscences associated with the two teams.

Just before the end of the final season of the Commonwealth Bank Trophy in 2007, the Herald Sun newspaper published a special four-page souvenir lift-out, delving into the stories behind the two teams. In exploring their formation in 1997, the Phoenix were described as a “glamour team” with a “star-studded line-up”. The Kestrels, however, were depicted as a team made up of a “mish-mash of players”. The Herald Sun article also recounted an anecdote provided by the chairman of the Kestrels, Bert Gaudion, who claimed that he initially “appealed to Netball Victoria for a share of the state’s best shooters but it didn’t happen”. The Kestrels would end the inaugural season on the bottom of the ladder.

The Victoria Cup, listing the results of games between the Melbourne Phoenix and the Melbourne Kestrels.

Between 1999 and 2006, while playing for the Commonwealth Bank Trophy, the two teams competed for the Victoria Cup. Reflecting their diverging pathways, the Phoenix won on 12 occasions and the Kestrels on four. However, it is the engraving on the trophy that provides a fascinating glimpse into the various machinations of sponsorship, with the “Melbourne Phoenix Powderpuff Girls” winning the Victoria Cup in June 2000. The Melbourne Phoenix would go on to win the championship that year. The engraving on that trophy actually refers to the “Melbourne Phoenix Powderpuff Girls”. This quirky discrepancy has now become an amusing part of the Phoenix story 

The 2000 Commonwealth Bank Trophy.

A glass trophy recording the scores from the derbies between Phoenix and Kestrels in 2007.

The colourful collection of Phoenix and Kestrels memorabilia in the Edith Hull Collection not only includes trophies, but also photographs, extensive press coverage, a range of dresses, posters, autographed bibs, membership cards and team pins.

And player cards. Yes, lots of player cards! Both the Kestrels and the Phoenix produced player profile cards. The cards featured photographic portraits of the players on one side, with the other side usually reserved for either player statistics or competition fixtures.

Examining the cards provides plenty of food for thought. For example, the 1997 playing cards for both teams lists the marital status of players. This designation disappears in 1998 and never reappears. But other details such as positions played, height and date of birth, state and national honours, and nicknames appear again and again. The listing of occupations – including jobs such as “teacher” and “travel consultant” – provides some insight into the fact that the players were not full-time athletes.

And then there is the description of “player strengths”. In 2005, Phoenix listed Sharelle McMahon’s strengths as “speed, shot and attitude” and in 2007 Bianca Chatfield’s attributes as “height, energy and elevation”. In 2004, the Kestrels listed Sharni Layton’s strengths as “great reach and focus” and Shae Bolton’s as “fitness and awareness”. A relic of a time gone by, and a glimpse into an important era in the sport, the player profile cards of both the Phoenix and Kestrels are a wonderfully redolent part of the Edith Hull Collection.

In 2008, with the creation of the ANZ Championship, the Melbourne Phoenix and Melbourne Kestrels merged to form the Melbourne Vixens, forever entwining their individual stories. It was in this context that the 2023 Heritage Round warm-up tops of the Vixens, showcasing the combined colours of both constituent teams, paid a creative tribute to the rich history of both clubs, helping to bring back vivid memories of a long-standing rivalry that forever shaped the story of netball in Victoria.

Curatorial Notes:

Anyone with information or memories to share related to the rivalry between the Phoenix and the Kestrels should contact Netball Victoria at communications@netballvic.com.au.