In a repurposed green Netball Victoria chocolate box that sits proudly in the display cabinet in Anne Heywood’s eastern suburban lounge-room are two precious souvenirs from a special event half-a-century ago.
One is the ancient Melbourne Sports Depot whistle Heywood used during that August day in Glen Iris when - wearing a white frock altered the night before by her mother - she was unaware she was being tested for her umpiring badge.
The other is the C badge itself, labelled 'Victorian Women’s Basketball Association', that the then 15-year-old was stunned to be presented with by long-serving official - later to become Victorian Netball Association life member - Nonie Oppy, for having passed.
Fifty years on, metropolitan Melbourne’s Stage 4 coronavirus restrictions forced the cancellation of an anniversary celebration planned at the Whitehorse Netball Association’s (WNA) Sportslink venue in Vermont.
But the milestone still drew wide recognition, and Heywood responded to the many messages of congratulations with a Facebook post of thanks and the acknowledgement that her teenage self would never have imagined that, all these years later, she would remain so intimately involved.
“It’s a love that’s been there since I was a kid. I’ve always loved sport but netball is the one that I always wanted to do,’’ she says, having spent the past 10 years in various roles at the WNA.
“It is important for people to know that you can take it through from teenage years, through having children and all sorts of things. It is a sport you can come in and out of through different parts of your life.’’
Heywood can still vividly remember her first game as a player; a grade two exhibition at a primary school parent-teacher day back in 1962. Stage fright was the winner, but the experience also taught the seven-year-old of the need to focus, while resilience and independence are netball-acquired skills that have also served her well.
Umpiring entered her orbit when she missed selection for the school team during her secondary years at Our Lady of Sion in Box Hill.
“It was as simple as that. So I used to go along and sit on the sidelines and watch and that’s where Sister Dorothy Renton said to me ‘would you like to umpire?’’’
Young Anne’s reaction? “Yes, please! It was the involvement, yes.’’
In some ways, it still is.
Normally, each Saturday - back when normality was a thing - Heywood would be at Sportslink from 8am training the next umpiring generation. Instead, on her anniversary weekend, the former committee member went for the permitted one-hour walk and then settled on the couch for an afternoon watching Suncorp Super Netball.
As recently as last year she shared the umpiring duties at a Year 10 inter-school carnival (65-year-old knees that now struggle to keep pace are likely to ensure it’s her last), and Monday nights are typically spent at NetSetG) sessions for the 9-and-unders.
Indeed, when the retired retail worker looks back over the five decades since receiving her badge, memories include the day she umpired three generations of netballers - grandma, mum and daughter - playing in the same team at Springvale.
Much further afield was an experience in Weipa, the mining town on Queensland's remote Cape York Peninsula, where she and her husband, Bill, were staying during one of their regular winter caravanning trips up north.
“We were at the campground, having a wine or two, when I heard a whistle blowing,’’ Heywood recalls. “I said to my husband ‘that’s netball’, and he laughed and said ‘we’ll see you later!’
“So I grabbed my handbag and I went across to what was a recreational shed and there were two mixed teams playing and a young lady was umpiring the whole court. They were people of all ages who worked in the mines.
“In the handbag I always carry my whistle and my rule book, and I just held the whistle up to her and she sort of nodded, and so we umpired the second half together.
“At the end of it they came and thanked me, which was very nice - I think I even got a beer out of it! - and a couple of them said to me ‘why did I call such and such’ or ‘why was that interpretation’, so we sat down and we talked rules for a good hour.
“That’s netball for you.’’
Closer to home, the Vixens are Heywood’s favourite team, and recruit Kate Eddy a Whitehorse Netball Association graduate, but most satisfying for the veteran umpire are her Saturday mornings supporting young whistleblowers as they learn the basics of what can often be a thankless, underappreciated job.
“They’re only 14, or sometimes even younger, and they need the confidence, because umpiring and playing netball these days, the things that people can say from the sidelines are absolutely shocking,’’ says Heywood.
“Most people who love netball (prefer to) play, and that’s where we all take off our hats to anyone that puts up their hand to umpire, and we go ‘yes’.’’
Written by Linda Pearce
