A TOP netball player had youngsters aiming high as she came to Greenock to lead a training session.

Niamh McCall, 21, who plays Strathclyde Sirens, Scotland's only professional netball team, led a coaching clinic at Notre Dame High, followed by a question and answer session.

The talented sportswoman, who represented her country at the Commonwealth Games in Australia in 2018 as the youngest member of the team, took time out to speak to the Tele during her visit.

Niamh, who started playing the sport when she was in primary four, said: "The best thing about netball is the friends I've made.

"It's a team sport and I've made lifelong friends through it.

"It shows the athleticism that girls have - people think it's a non-contact sport but it's not.

"I thought the girls here were very good and enthusiastic, much better than I was at this age."

Niamh says that the World Cup being televised in 2019 brought netball to a wider audience of young people across Scotland and England.

She said: "I didn't have netball on TV when I was growing up."

Niamh rose through the ranks from club to district, national development and under-17 and under-21 national squads.

She also became the first player born in the 2000s to receive a senior cap in netball, playing against Northern Ireland in 2016.

Niamh was part of the World Youth Cup team in Botswana in 2017 but participating in the Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast was hard to beat.

She said: "Playing at the Games was crazy.

"It was an amazing experience."

During her visit Niamh got the chance to be re-united with one of her former coaches, Active Schools co-ordinator Claire Munn.

She coached Niamh when she was 13 and in the National Development Squad.

Claire, who has been organising the netball sessions over the summer, says it was a happy coincidence that Niamh was the Sirens player who came to the school.

He said: "It is good that the girls can see their journey through the sport from primary school to club, district and national development squad is the same as Niamh's and that if they are 100 per about it then they can do it too."

The summer netball sessions have been funded by sportsscotland as part of their 'Get Into Summer' programme.

More than 40 children over the two sessions got the opportunity to train alongside Niamh.

Claire said: "A lot of these kids have never played before and those who have did not get the chance to play for the last 18 months.

"This has given them a thirst for it again, as they've been missing it."