Tracey Neville has revealed she suffered a miscarriage a day after leading England to netball Commonwealth gold.
Neville, who recently announced she is expecting a child with partner Michael Timmins, coached the Roses to their first major title on the Gold Coast in April 2018.
“I had a miscarriage and then I went into a three-hour media fest to celebrate what is something that I’d been waiting something like 30 years for,” 42-year-old Neville recalls in an interview with BBC Breakfast.
“You think to yourself: ‘This can’t be right.’ You see other ladies who have been through traumatic situations take time off work, but I just wasn’t willing to do that.
“This was my family, this was my commitment. I didn’t want to miss this journey that the Roses were on because, in a way – and it’s awful to say – the Roses were my priority.”
In a wide-ranging interview, Neville also discussed the stigma of being an older mum, the support of her high-profile family, a possible return to coaching England and her faith in successor Jess Thirlby.
Neville announced she would be leaving as head coach just before the World Cup began in Liverpool in July, but it was a decision she had made months earlier.
She had suffered another miscarriage at Christmas and then made the decision – one she describes as “one of most difficult of my life” – two months after January’s international Quad Series.
She explains: “It was when the girls had gone back to their clubs and then reality started to hit.
“I looked at taking a sabbatical but I’d be putting huge pressure on myself to get pregnant, and we all know it doesn’t work like that.
“My family said don’t do it until after the World Cup, but I’m a really honest person and I said I can’t go into the tournament knowing that information.”
Neville told the squad, located around the world, on a group phone call.
Recalling how she felt sick prior to making the call, Neville adds: “The girls were amazing. They knew how important it was to me, they knew how much Michael meant to me and my family.”
Neville, who is the sister of former Manchester United footballers Gary and Phil, led the Roses to bronze in Liverpool, matching their performance of four years earlier in Sydney, her first major tournament in charge.
