A NEW year and a whole set of new international netball series’ to look forward to. The first of these is the battle between the English Roses and Jamaican Sunshine Girls which is set to get underway next week.

This series kicks off a huge year in international netball, and a big month for particularly the Roses.

After this series, England are off to South Africa later this month to join the hosts, Silver Ferns and Diamonds in a Quad Series.

But that does not mean this series is not important for the Jamaicans.

They are coming off a year of vast improvement in 2022, so will be keen to keep that momentum going into 2023.

The Sunshine Girls can also head into this series with a little bit of a mental advantage over the English, as they have only lost this series to the opposition twice in the 11 times this series has been run.

However, they will be missing a couple of their best defenders in Shamera Sterling and Latanya Wilson, which when having to come against the likes of Helen Housby and Jo Harten, is not a pleasant proposition. The likes of Kadie-Ann Dehaney will likely have to step up and really take the likely starting opportunity with both hands.

However their shooting end is one of the most feared in the world, with Jhaniele Fowler and Shimona Nelson both coming off stellar Super Netball seasons, and will be keen to continue that form and start the international year off on the right foot.

They will have a tough English defensive end to contend with though. Geva Mentor is an absolute stalwart and despite her age is not really slowing down, while after a break out series Down Under, Funmi Fadoju will be keen to show that performance against Australia was not a once off.

Speaking of the teams, there has been some change to the England Squad in the past few days.

Eleanor Cardwell is still managing an injury she sustained before Christmas, and as such will miss the series against Jamaica and may also miss the upcoming Quad series. At this stage no replacement player has been named for her for this series.

They are no late scratchings from the Jamaicans at time of writing, but as previously mentioned are missing a few key players.

The series kicks off tomorrow night English time and Thursday morning Australian time.

Squads

England

Imogen Allison

Jade Clarke      

Sophie Drakeford-Lewis

Funmi Fadoju  

Layla Guscoth  

Jo Harten          

Alice Harvey*  

Helen Housby  

Laura Malcolm

Elle McDonald*

Geva Mentor   

Natalie Metcalf

Chelsea Pitman

Olivia Tchine* 

Fran Williams       

*May also be considered for England A fixtures

Jamaica

Jhaniele Fowler

Shanice Beckford

Shimona Nelson

Rebekah Robinson

Khadijah Williams

Nicole Dixon-Rocherster

Jodi-Ann Ward

Kadie-Ann Dehaney

Malysha Kelly

Tafiya Hunter

Crystal Plummer

Abigale Sutherland

Theresa Beckford

Roxonna McLean

Fixtures

Wednesday 11 January, 7.15pm local (6:15am 12th Jan AEDT) – AO Arena, Manchester

Saturday 14 January, 2.15pm local (1:15am 15th Jan AEDT) – Copper Box Arena, London

Sunday 15 January, 2pm local (1am 16th Jan AEDT) – Copper Box Arena, London