Recently, Celtic Dragons fan and all-round netball fanatic, Nicole Fisher (née Harry) from Torfaen tied the knot and on her big day was in receipt of a rather unique wedding present – a signed Celtic Dragons netball! Here, Nicole tells the story of how she came to receive a signed ball on her big day and how netball has played such a huge role in her life…
“Most of us are from the Torfaen area and we play for Cwmbran Netball Club – most of us playing for their C team. We met when we started to go to their back to netball session that they run on a Wednesday 6-7pm at Cwmbran Stadium.
“I used to play netball all the way through school and for a while after, but stopped when I went to university because I couldn’t manage everything. I then graduated and was working 9-5 and wanted to get back to netball because I’d always loved it.
“I’d moved to Pontypool with my (now!) husband and didn’t know many people locally, so thought it would be a good way to get into netball and also meet people and socialise – I couldn’t have asked for anything better!
“We started on a back to netball route and that summer the club held trials, and there was so much interest that they created the C team and we went from there.
“This is our second season as a C team and we absolutely love it and it is everything I could have hoped for in terms of actually playing netball and improving fitness. Not just that, but we’re also such a close group of girls too. Our first season we finished bottom of the league – but we didn’t care. This season however, we’ve improved and we finished on 10th out of 15 teams so we were really pleased to have improved from last year.
“I was also poorly this time last year and diagnosed with a heart condition. For a while I wasn’t sure whether I would be able to play again, but the team and the club have been so supportive and I honestly don’t think I would have got through it all if it wasn’t for all of the girls, who gave me a reason to keep going.
“I got the okay after having an operation in June 2018 and went back to trials last August. Now here we are at the end of a second season with the C’s and they all still continue to look after me now.
“Netball is amazing and we are all obsessed, so much so we don’t want to break training for the summer and looking for all of the fun leagues to keep us going!
“Cwmbran Netball Club and especially our C team have allowed me to make friends for life. It meant so much they were all able to come to my wedding and it was honestly the best thing to have had a netball with all of the Celtic Dragons’ signatures on – it just sums us all up!”
Celtic Dragons would like to congratulate Nicole on her marriage and wish her and the rest of Cwmbran C all of the very best ahead of next netball season. We look forward to seeing Nicole and the gang in Superleague 2020!
