It's shaping up to be a season of seconds for Nicola Smith.
The South African is on the hunt for her second consecutive Netball Super League title in 2025 after clinching the crown with Loughborough Lightning last year.
This time round she will be suiting up in yellow, having signed for Manchester Thunder for her second year in the league.
It means that the goal keeper and goal defence will reunite with fellow SPAR Proteas Elmerè van der Berg.
"Elmerè is actually my best friend," she said. "We only met in 2018 when we played our first trials against each other and then we were selected for the same team and she was my roommate on our first tour together.
“It is really good for Netball South Africa with the players being exposed to this league and it is nice seeing someone you know from home every week, home feels a bit closer.”
Having played provincial netball from the age of 13, Smith stepped up to the senior set up in 2020 and represented the Proteas at the 2022 Commonwealth Games and 2023 Netball World Cup, the latter on home soil in Cape Town.
Smith saw a disrupted start to her 2025, breaking her arm in the international Sunshine Series against Jamaica but will be cheering her new team on from the sidelines before returning to the court.
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