In 2022, Mighty Netball launched a competition for the children to design a size 4 netball that could be rolled out and used across all Mighty Netball venues and beyond. We had just received and started to use our bespoke size 3 balls which were brightly coloured and fun, the children adored them. A designer had created the size 3 balls, this time we thought we would give the opportunity to the children. We knew we wanted a size 4 ball which was loved just as much. At Mighty, we use size 3 balls up to approximately age 8 then size 4 balls for age 9-12.

The competition was so well received, we couldn’t believe the excitement and volume of fantastic entries. There were literally hundreds to look through. We had beautiful drawings, computer designs, photographs and even some 3D model designs. We were blown away by the variety of creativity and ideas that came in.

It was lovely to look through all the entries and the HQ team were even considering how great some of the designs would look on the Mighty Netball merchandise and clothing (now there’s a thought!).

After carefully going through all the brilliant entries, the winning design was chosen by Co-founders Corinne and Laura. The artist was Ella from Mighty Netball Amersham. You may have already spotted Ella in our December newsletter with her lovely artwork. Ella won a whole year of Mighty Netball and 3 of her own newly designed netballs.

We had been getting updates on the progress from the factory and were very excited when they let us know in February that the balls were in transit to Mighty HQ. They arrived to the HQ in April and we couldn’t get them unloaded and pumped up quickly enough!

The first person we had to share this exciting news with, was of course Ella. We visited Ella to deliver her netballs and she was over the moon with how the design looked. Ella and her sister Evie were straight out into the garden shooting goals. Mum even said she was woken up at 7am the next morning by the dulcet tones of bouncing netballs on the patio – the best alarm ever!

It’s amazing what a difference the right sporting equipment can make to a child’s engagement in their activity, especially the correct size for smaller hands plus when as brightly coloured and fun like this lovely netball.

A huge well done again to Ella and thank you for such a beautiful ball that netballers everywhere can enjoy using for many years to come.

If you love this ball as much as we do, it is on sale on our website now.