Changing sides with Silver Ferns Vice-Captain Laura Langman

Laura Langman has been, seen and conquered every fear in the netballing world and I was lucky enough to get an insight with her about where her motivation to pursue a career Netball came from and her feelings about her past career with the Magic and her current status with the Mystics.

Q: What sport did you first start playing when you were growing up?

A: I grew up on a dairy farm, in a very small settlement called Tepahu. We pretty much did any sport, we did whatever was going. So I didn’t just play one sport I played whatever was available. If we had to travel Mum and Dad would take us there. We were very lucky.

Q: When did you first start playing netball for a club?

A: I did play Netball for my school back in primary school, and then it wasn’t really until high school where Netball took off for me. I trialed for the next two spring teams. I had a fantastic mentor and passionate equal volunteer who saw that little bit of potential or challenge, and she fostered me through my netball at school.

Q: How did you get selected to play for the Magic?

A: I played club netball and still played rep netball as well, and obviously at that stage I never played it because I always had the goal of one day wanting to be a Silver Fern or anything like that, it was a pure enjoyment factor. Then in 5th form it just started taking off really. I was invited to be a trainee and be the odd trainee partner to fill in. As a centre, I was asked to go in and trial. The year before that I was in the development squad, then boom it kind of just took off.

Q: That’s the thing with sport you never know where it can take you.

A: Exactly, it has taken me to a lot of amazing places and some pretty great experiences. There are equally some high and low points, but you learn from all of them. It’s being awesome.

Q: What were some of the low points in your career?

A: I would probably say when I was injured in 2007. It was just before my first world champs. I had a stress fracture in my left foot and there was a big chance that I wasn’t going to make it. Luckily enough I was a fast healer and although I only had three months to get right. Come the first day of the world champs I had my first fitness test which was the first game and I past it so I was very lucky, so that would definitely be one of the low points.

Q: What were some of the high points in your career so far?

A: I’ve being lucky. I’ve being involved in a few but two that definitely stuck out would be the 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games. It was just a phenomenal experience on and off the courts in terms of the challenges we faced.

Then I would have to be the Magic 2012 year, again the challenges and the ability to rise above adversity, to come out on top, like there’s no better feeling, so defiantly those two.

Q: What was the atmosphere like in the 2010 Commonwealth Games final?

A: Honestly because Netball is the last event of the Commonwealth games, it was really quite exciting because the closing ceremony was looming and this was the last event, and it was the last medal to be presented. So when you put in a lot of support and because of India not having a massive Netball background, it was really interesting to see what side the crowds took and who they were backing. They were a crowd that hasn’t seen Netball played a lot. So they were supporting based on a team that they liked not nessecarily going on an informed decision. It was an amazing atmosphere.

Q: How hard was it to play in the Grand Final for the Magic in 2012? Was there any added pressure from the media and fans?

A: No, what I think was really unique about that 2012 year was that we did in that campaign, we measured ourselves against ourselves so it didn’t matter what the opposition was doing, it didn’t matter what happened before us, it was whether we measured up to our expectations that we had set for that particular game. It was a funny game at half time it felt like the game was going to blow out in terms of the Melbourne Vixens because the momentum was with the Vixens and the break came at the perfect time. I always think of that “third quarter” as that “championship quarter” and the Waikato / Bay Of Plenty Magic, even today in the ANZ Championship, they are renowned for massive third quarters and we just got on a role and it wasn’t until the last two minutes of the game that we gained control, even later than that in the game, so it was an unbelievable match and for which we were 99.9% not in control. So I think that made it even better.

Q: But has it being a big change coming from the Magic up to Auckland to play for the Mystics?

A: It’s massive. But I did do it for a reason and a good reason. I wanted to be able to work more with Cathrine Latu and Maria Tutaia on a regular basis to develop an understanding, and until I did it I saw it as a massive challenge and in terms of playing netball the year before it I was able to create a better performance and winning culture. I had certainly being handed that challenge.