After finishing outside the top four last season, the pain of not playing finals netball is one of the driving forces for the side in 2018.

“Having to sit there and watch the Sunshine Coast Lightning win the grand final on our home ground is not something we like to do, so we’ve used that hurt to drive us in the off-season," Simpson told Queensland Firebirds.

"We were playing netball out of the fear of losing and it wasn’t until the last three games that we really hit our straps when we were out of finals.

"So this year we really want to implement fearless netball,” she said.

For Simpson personally, she will be driven by the loss to England in the gold medal match a fortnight ago.

Swifts shooter Helen Housby was on the English side that afternoon and scored the winning goal.

“With that hurt I’ve lined up a few of the English players that are in the teams to come, starting with Helen Housby this weekend, I think it adds that extra fire in the belly,” Simpson said.

The Firebirds face the Swifts at 3pm this afternoon live on the Netball Live app.