Coaching opportunities at international level are as rare as hen's teeth in Australian netball so when the opportunity arose for Rob Wright, the Swifts gaffer immediately registered his interest.
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Wright and his Swifts right-hand Megan Anderson were on Wednesday named as Stacey Marinkovich's assistants for this year's Fast5 tournament, which will give the duo an opportunity to coach against England, South Africa, New Zealand, Jamaica and Malawi.
It'll also give Wright the chance to prove his coaching credentials on the international stage, according to Netball Australia's head of high performance Andrew Collins.
"There's no question that you want to be able to test these coaches at international level and they've got to test themselves and see if that's where they have that aspiration as well," Collins said.
"We have such limited opportunity outside the Diamonds and our 21s team that's about to go to the netball Youth World Cup, this is really the only other national team program that we have.
"Rob's a great student of the game. His passion and his interest and his knowledge, when he's not coaching it he's watching it, he's learning about it, he's challenging himself and his athletes.
"Rob will bring that to the group. He has a really good technical and tactical awareness as a coach and you've seen that with the Swifts.
"They've been a terrific team over a long period of time and even this year with the significant changes they've had with the playing staff, I think he's gotten a really great performance out of that group.
"I expect Rob to be able to bring that. He's quite innovative in the way he coaches, he's not afraid to use technology, he's not afraid to try different things and that really suits itself to that Fast5 format."
Collins stopped short of anointing Wright as a possible future Australian Diamonds coach, a position held by Lisa Alexander since 2011, but said any chance to perform on the international stage was a huge opportunity.
Wright was told last week that he'd been awarded the Fast5 assistant coaching role, and hoped it would help lay a platform for future chances on the international stage.
"I would love to be involved internationally, but often there's very few opportunities to be able to do that," Wright said.
"It's a great opportunity. I've coached some of the best players in the world over the last couple of years and I feel like it's just another step.
"I always think it's just about trying to get better myself, I like to keep challenging myself and testing myself, and I also think I have a lot to offer."
Wright is still in the process of rebuilding the Swifts after the club lost the majority of its playing roster following last year's grand-final loss to the Queensland Firebirds.
The two former powerhouses square off again on Saturday as part of a final-round double-header at Qudos Bank Arena, with Wright's side hopeful of finishing its inaugural Super Netball campaign with a fourth win.
Both sides will miss the finals, but Queensland head back to Sydney in a buoyant mood after knocking off the Giants last weekend, thanks in part to another starring role from Jamaican international Romelda Aiken.
"Romelda's the hardest shooter in the world to stop because she's a good athlete, she's super tall with a big jump, she's very good," Wright said.
"There's no rocket science to it, if the work's not done outside [the goal circle] then it doesn't matter who you are, you can't stop anything.
"There'll be plenty of work being done to hold them up and keep them as far off the circle as we possibly can."
