Netball New Zealand says the ANZ Premiership will post a significant loss of around $3.7m in 2026 as the competition's future remains in serious doubt.
It comes as the organisation continues working with the New Zealand Netball Players Association and the game's regional zones to secure a sustainable future for domestic netball.
1News reported yesterday Netball New Zealand was seriously considering putting the ANZ Premiership competition on hold, or returning to an amateur one, for financial reasons.
NNZ Board Chair Alastair Carruthers said the loss has been covered by drawing on the organisation's cash reserves, which was unsustainable.
“We actually don't have a clear solution at the moment for the future of the domestic league," he told Breakfast.
“We have been looking at the last three years, and unfortunately, losses have been mounting with a very difficult loss this year, which will be funded from Netball New Zealand's reserves. But it is difficult to sustain these types of losses, so it does need a rethink," he said.
Carruthers said the organisation had changed the eligibility requirements for Silver Ferns selection as the work on the 2027 domestic competition continues.
"Under this change, any player who chooses to play overseas will remain eligible for selection to the Silver Ferns. This is effective immediately for the current selection round and will continue for the duration of a player’s contract if they sign a multi-year contract," he said.
"I think it's a really good thing that while we can't create immediate certainty about 2027 and beyond, players do have the certainty of being able to look for work and opportunities, but still be eligible for the Ferns."
The next World Cup is next year.
Carruthers said the organisation needed to find a model that "doesn't lose so much money" to be able to create a pathway "from the incredible community participation through a domestic competition that enables people to see themselves as being really successful".
"I think netball in New Zealand is one of the most undervalued sports in the country. It has been played by girls and women for 102 years. I think it should be loved by sponsors, loved by broadcasters just as much as audiences do. We've probably got a challenge about how we sell that value, how we unlock that value, how we reward our players more, and it won't be an instant fix. But it's very much the vision that we've got to create a more sustainable system."
This year the ANZ Premiership was exclusively aired on TVNZ. It reached more than 1 million people on TVNZ 2 and a further 169,500 accounts on TVNZ+. The season was streamed over 868,700 times on TVNZ+.
Sky held the broadcast rights from 2017-2025.
"We are absolutely committed to a competition. I'm simply not able to say whether it's amateur or not, or just what the commercial basis will be," Carruthers said.
Silver Ferns
"I don't want to be distracted too much, but I know there's a lot of girls who are in the ANZ competition who probably have a bit of anxiety as to what that looks like."
"We're going to try to trust the process that there is work being done behind the scenes, probably not as fast as some people would want, but that's out of our control. So mostly trying to focus mainly on Commonwealth right now and we'll deal with whatever comes after."
Last year the organisation went through a rough patch in which Dame Noeline and her coaching staff were stood down after some players raised concerns following a training camp in Sydney.
Yvette McCausland-Durie was brought in to replace her as interim coach during the Taini Jamison Trophy Series and Constellation Cup, and Dame Noeline returned to the role at the end of 2025.
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