During the reign of Queen Victoria, the royal family was pretty international—a prince from Germany, kids who went on to rule Germany and Russia—but since the House of Windsor emerged during World War I, the family pivoted to having an essential Britishness. Nowhere is this more obvious than their eternal love of hats, but every so often a small gift reminds us of how much the royal family really are perfect Brits. At an investiture ceremony Tuesday, Prince William awarded a CBE honor to netball player Geva Mentor, and Mentor said she brought a small netball as a gift for Princess Charlotte. “I mentioned that I had a netball for little Charlotte, I think it’s so important that kids know what netball is and grow up with it,” Mentor told the Press Association.
The Cambridge family already has a connection to the sport. When Kate Middleton was in high school, she played on the netball team. According to Hello! the young royal is already taking after her mother, Kate Middleton, when it comes to sports. In March, the magazine reported that she took tennis lessons along with Prince George, and is already riding her bike without training wheels.
Netball is a riff on basketball that features two teams of seven. Invented in England in the 1890s, it is usually played outdoors on a rectangular court, and the netted ring has no backboard. Pictures of netball games in the Victorian Era show women playing in hoop skirts and petticoats. Despite having early players in America, it never really took off in the U.S., and has remained a confusing exoticism for many. It’s played around the world, but is the most popular in the United Kingdom, which has a semi-professional league.
Since 2000, Mentor has played on the English International team, which won the international championship this year. Mentor is admitting that her little known sport needs a bit of consciousness raising, and a gift for Charlotte is a clever way to do it. William apparently showed some knowledge of the sport during the ceremony. “He said that netball made sense with the height that I have, and he mentioned the Commonwealth Games in 2018 and our achievements,” Mentor said. “It’s fantastic that the royal family are aware of what was going on there because it was a moment in history, which was not only great for us personally but for netball in England.”
Back in September 2018, Meghan Markle joined in a game of netball at the Coach Core Awards, perhaps as a way to show off how English she is becoming. She did play in an Oscar de la Renta top and stilettos, though, proving that she somehow can do feats that would permanently injure mere mortals.
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