In the club’s 50+ year history, many things have changed. The most recent significant change has been the name of the club.
From 1969 – 2020, the Club was known as the Happy Valley Netball Club. The club was renamed the Flagstaff Hill Falcons Netball Club in September 2020. We are part of the Flagstaff Hill Community Centre and Recreational Ground which is also home to Flagstaff Hill Football Club, Flagstaff Hill Cricket Club, Flagstaff Hill Tennis Club and Southern Hills Little Athletics.
The township of Happy Valley consisted of an Institute Hall, a Post Office and an Oval. The original oval had to be relocated in 1967, from the corner of Windebanks and Happy Valley Drive to Taylors Road because of water runoff into the reservoir. The Tennis Club was also relocated and they built two courts at the new site. In 1969 the Happy Valley Basketball Club was started and shared the clubroom and facilities with the Tennis Club. Netball was still called Women’s Basketball until 1970.
Our Club played in the Southern Basketball Association and travelled to other towns each Saturday. These towns included Christies Beach, Old Noarlunga, McLaren Flat and Vale and as far south as Willunga (where the finals were held).
In 1974 the Southern United Netball Association (SUNA) was formed. Two courts were built at Christies Beach, in 1976 six courts were built at Jordan Drive behind the Morphett Vale Oval and finally in 1978 the 12 courts were built at the Wilfred Taylor Reserve. Our Club joined SUNA in 1977 as had other clubs although some joined the Great Southern Netball Association and still played Saturdays. The new SUNA competition was held evenings during the week and they had both a summer and winter competition.
We officially become a joint user in January 2005 at the Flagstaff Community Sports Centre. We have the use of four of the six tennis courts and the clubrooms for meetings and presentations.
