The experienced centre has been named as the team’s new captain for this year’s ANZ Premiership.
She takes over from co-captains Gina Crampton, who has moved to the Northern Stars, and Te Huinga Selby-Rickit, who is her vice-captain.
Tonight’s pre-season game in Timaru against the Mainland Tactix, which begins at 6pm, will be the 30-year-old’s first chance to lead on court.
It begins a run of pre-season matches, which include another in Timaru tomorrow morning and one in Queenstown on Thursday against the Central Pulse.
While the role may push Saunders out of her comfort zone, she is not planning to change too much.
"I’m not going to try to be someone I’m not, hopefully try to be a little bit more vocal," she said.
"But just try to lead by example and we’ve got lots of great leaders on the team.
"So I think it’s a great opportunity for lots of the girls to step up and help each other out. I see it as a collective effort."
Saunders returned to the team yesterday after being part of the Silver Ferns’ victorious Constellation Cup series against Australia.
She enjoyed that and felt the team was continuing to grow.
It also made for ideal preparation coming into the ANZ Premiership.
"It’s always good to get a bit of game-time under your belt and there’s no-one better to play than the Aussies.
"Everyone had such an enjoyable week, but everyone’s not looking forward to going back and playing each other now.
"We’ve trained together for such a long time in the months leading into this. Now it’s going to go back to being on-court enemies — that’s going to be interesting."
It is a new-look Steel team she returns to, with five new faces in the squad this year.
Only she, Selby-Rickit and Kate Heffernan remain from the team that won the 2018 title.
While she said some of the newcomers might be thrown in at the deep end, it would be good to see the development
week-by-week.
She was enjoying the new energy in the group as well.
"It’s been really good, like a breath of fresh air.
"I keep telling everyone it’s like I’ve changed franchises without having to move teams.
"It’s been really good. Everyone’s slotted in really well and brought little bits of themselves.
"I think it’s really exciting to see how it’s going to come together.
"It’s a super young team which is always good. Everyone’s excited and eager to put it out on court."
The season proper begins on April 18 when the Steel faces the Tactix in Invercargill.
