“It’s just that one word, isn’t it?
“Olympics.
“When you grow up, get involved in or follow a sport you know instantaneously that it is the biggest event.”
Those were the words of Olympian Katharine Merry when we asked her what made the Olympics so special.
Yet for the 13 million active netballers in 120 countries worldwide, being part of the Olympics, has never been an option.
“Netball deserves its place on the biggest stage, just from those statistics alone,” Merry said.
“You cannot have more than 13 million people participating in a sport in such the breadth of countries and nations that netball has and not have it on the world stage.
“Every time we have a Commonwealth Games or a Netball World Cup, the levels are raised again, the profile is raised again, so the next stop for me should be Brisbane 2032 because netball deserves to have its Olympic debut in 2032, hands down.”
World Netball (WN) and Netball Australia (NA) are currently pursuing a bid for Olympic inclusion in Brisbane 2032, including promoting our value proposition with a range of key decision makers and influencers across government and the Olympics movement.
With Australia being the number one WN World Ranked country and netball being Australia’s number one participation sport for women, Olympic Bronze Medallist and netball broadcaster Merry believes that Australia is the perfect place for netball to make its debut, she said: “As soon as the Games were announced that they were going to Brisbane myself and my friends, netballers or not, said, ‘this is it, this is the perfect opportunity’.
“It is the perfect place to put netball and give it its Olympic debut.
“The Netball World Cup Sydney 2027 we know is coming and that will give netball another nice little boost towards potentially Brisbane 2032 as well.
“The Netball World Cup has been held in Australia more than once, and there’s a reason for that.
“Australia loves sport.
“Australia loves netball.”
In September 2025 at the Netball World Youth Cup, WN and NA launched a campaign calling for the Netball Family to support netball’s goal to be included in the Brisbane 2032 Games.
Merry believes the timing of the campaign was really important in inspiring the next generation.
“For me, as a former athlete, it’s about how special it would be for the ones that potentially run out in the dress of their nation on the biggest stage for the first time.
“Those players at the Netball World Youth Cup, they are the ones that will be inspired just by the chance (of the Olympics), by the opportunity.
“When you mathematically work out their ages, they’ll be sitting there now and thinking that could be me.
“That in itself is inspiring and will push them on to be the best that they can possibly be.”
“I’ve commentated on world records, left, right and centre in loads of sports – It’s great.
“But I’d chop my right hand off to be the lead commentator and to be able to say the words of, ‘Here we go then folks, the first centre pass in the first ever Olympic netball match’.
“The sport has proven on numerous occasions; over many Netball World Cups and Commonwealth Games that the athletes are world class.
“The sport is world class, and it deserves the platform on the biggest sporting show on earth.”