The London Mavericks will play their first home match of the revamped Netball Super League (NSL) in Essex next year.

It is part of the sport's attempt to reach new communities, grow the game in England and turn top teams professional.

The match will take place at the Brentwood Centre, on 23 March, against NIC Leeds Rhinos.

London Mavericks director of netball, Tamsin Greenway said: "We have been wanting this for such a long time. It was a really bold move from England Netball and the Super League Last year. It is really exciting times for netball."

The Mavericks will also play two NSL fixtures at Wembley Arena with other games taking place at the Hertfordshire Sports Village in Hatfield.

The NSL has been reduced from 10 teams to eight for the 2025 campaign with Team Bath, Strathclyde Sirens, Surrey Storm and Severn Stars dropping out and Birmingham Panthers and Nottingham Forest Netball being added.

The restructuring was part of a 10-year plan to make the league professional.

As part of the new-look NSL landscape, the eight competing teams have been assigned community regions with London Mavericks' counties being made up of East Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, London and Middlesex.

Netball players at St Martin's School in Brentwood were excited by the opportunities the sports reboot can offer.

Year 10 student Bella said: "I'm so excited to know that they will be playing locally and I can easily just go and watch pro netball."

The regular NSL season starts for the Mavericks with an away match at Cardiff Dragons on 14 March.

Fourteen further games were followed by a new look end of season format featuring a major and minor semi-final followed by the preliminary final.

This season, fans can watch one match per round of the NSL on BBC iPlayer and the BBC Sport website and app.