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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2011-09-14 Daily Xml
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WOMEN'S SPORTING ACHIEVEMENTS

Ms BEDFORD (Florey) (15:41): In light of Sam Stosur's historic win in the US Open, women's tennis has been highlighted in the media this week. Sam is the first Australian woman to win a grand slam singles title since Evonne Goolagong Cawley in Wimbledon's 1980 tournament, and the first Australian winner of the US Open since Margaret Court Smith in 1973. Margaret, of course, also won in 1962, 1969 and 1970.

Sam's career has a connection to Adelaide, as we see in today's The Advertiser that Bruce Rehn spotted 7-year-old Sam at Memorial Drive, and he nurtured her during her first three years and, as he notes, gave her the right technique from the beginning, laying a solid foundation for her hard work, which has now really paid off. Congratulations to Sam and her team. She is a fine role model and will inspire many players to become future champions.

She will be very welcome on her next trip to South Australia to visit the Valley View Tennis Club. They have a wonderful junior development program and I am sure everyone will make her very welcome. Everyone in this house, too, I am sure, hopes she will hold many more trophies aloft in her career.

Another recent outstanding performance came at the world athletic championships in Daegu, when Sally Pearson became the world record holder in the 100 metres hurdles, the fastest time in19 years and the fourth fastest time ever of 12.28 seconds, only 0.07 seconds away from the fastest time ever. The three women above her, according to a report in The Advertiser on 5 September, have some question marks over them as their records were some years ago.

This is a very competitive event. After her silver medal win in Beijing in 2008 and coming into an Olympic year in London 2012, Sally is well placed to achieve another marvellous result. Australia's high-performance manager, Eric Hollingsworth, rated Pearson's victory as one of the best things he had ever seen in the sport:

'We reckon this is the equal greatest performance by an Australian in a championships (including the Olympics),' he said.

This is another example of hard work paying off. We are all proud of Sally's achievements, and we wish her the very best for the future.

I would also like to talk about netball today and the recent media attention to South Australia's greatest players and the champion team selected from the all-time greats from both the Thunderbirds and the now no longer Ravens, who played their final season in 2002. A household name in netball circles is Michelle den Dekker. She was named as our greatest player ever and was also chosen goal defence in the championship team, ahead of other greats like Kathryn Harby-Williams and Mo'onia Gerrard.

Michelle played 84 tests with the Diamonds and was a three-time world championship player, twice captaining Australia to the title. We are very proud of her efforts. Other people mentioned in the team were goal shooter Jenny Borlase, goal attack Natalie Medhurst, wing attack Laura von Bertouch, centre Nat von Bertouch, wing defence Peta Scholz and goal keeper Sarah Sutter.

Netball is a very popular sport for all our young women in South Australia and I know that every member has a great interest in their local team. Michelle played locally with Garville before moving to Queensland to captain-coach the Firebirds. She is a great role model.

My local teams include Tango and the Modbury Hawks, and I was recently at Modbury Hawks' prize night and disco night as a rep for the member for Wright. These clubs both enjoy wonderful parent support and their teams and clubs are growing as they provide a great environment to learn and enjoy sport.

Lastly, I would like to speak about hockey. My local club, the North East Hockey Club, or the Zulu Warriors as they are better known, caters for all ages and abilities and also has a great committee guiding its activities.

The article I would like to highlight and quote from is from The Advertiser on 7 June which talked about South Australia claiming its first Australian championship in 16 years. The Southern Stars had four players called up to the national Hockeyroos squad. National final hero, Georgie Parker, was named in the squad for the first time and Holly Evans and Elise Stacy earned recalls, while Bianca Greenshields maintained her place on the list under new coach Adam Commens.

Unfortunately, I am informed that Georgie did not get to play in the team at the championship and the Hockeyroos actually finished sixth in the tournament. Our girls, however, continue to push for selection and with a fine record and tradition in hockey in this country, our Olympic prospects are in very good hands.

I know the house is well aware of the South Australian results in the recent National Calisthenics Championships, so I will finish off by just saying that there is a South Australian team about to go to Darwin to compete and we wish them all the very best. Another event that I think is really important is this weekend when the member for Hammond and I will be at Murray Bridge for the International HPV Pedal Prix. It is great that so many women and girls are participating in these teams now. We wish everybody at Murray Bridge all the very best.

I would also like say, 'Go the Modbury Hawks.' A female team is now competing in the SANFL and the Modbury Jets have encouraged female participation in soccer for many years. So all in all, I think, while we talk about sport as being elite and we know most of the pages at the back of the newspaper concentrate on men's sport, women in sport have really held their own and I look forward to more successes in the future.

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