THE battle for the 2016 Rawson Homes A-grade premiership has been thrown wide open, with three-time champions St Collegians conspicuously absent from this year's draw.
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The competition powerhouse took home double honours in 2015, winning the minor premiership and downing Fusions Blue in the grand final.
At the time, star shooter Megan Liplyn admitted 2015 may have been the side's "last season playing together".
It means as players take to the court in Saturday's season openers, the premiership is well and truly up for grabs.
"Collegians won the last three years so it throws it wide open and it opens it right up and makes it anybody's year to take control," Dubbo Netball Association (DNA) umpire convenor and Fusions club registrar Karen Weekes said.
Saints' departure leaves Fusions Blue - rebranded in 2016 to Fusions All-Blacks - as the apparent team to beat in 2016 under captain-coach Tash Watts-Tehiko.
But with a full card of eight teams taking to the court in A-grade, they'll have some firm competition.
Dubbo Netball has grown dramatically in recent years, and now supports eight teams in grades A, B, C and E, and seven in D-grade.
Weekes said the growth was thanks to concerted efforts by the DNA.
"We're very pleased that we've got a full A-grade competition and we've got good depth across all of the teams," Weekes said.
"It's been a concerted effort on the behalf of the committee and clubs like Fusions who want to see a strong A-grade competition because that's the pinnacle of our Saturday competition.
"It has just been a lot of consistent effort on the behalf of the committee to consistently keep it growing and to have that level of competition and to show it off to the rest of Dubbo and the surrounding areas."
The Fusions club will field four teams in the A-grade competition this year, where they will be joined by the Deadly Dragonflies, Narromine Bombers, Apollo Cruisers and a Macquarie Anglican Grammar School (MAGS) side headed by Michelle Williams.
Williams is again looking to develop and nurture younger players who have to lift to pay A-grade, rather than looking to more established names, Weekes said.
Weekes said junior development had become a focus across the board, with a number of under-15s and 17s representative players, and all of the under-21s now competing in A-grade.
"We have about half of the 17 reps playing A-grade and then this year we have all of 15 reps playing either A-grade or B-grade. So that's really looking to develop them as players," Weekes said.
"Krystal Dallinger, she's playing her first year in A-grade this year, all of the 21s reps are playing A-grade, all of the open state league and all of the state league championships players in A-grade.
"It also gives our junior reps the platform to keep continuing to develop their skills to go further in the representative arena."
The action kicks off from 1.30pm Saturday with Fusions Thunder taking on Fusions All-Blacks and Fusions Lightning facing the Deadly Dragonflies.