Mwawi discovers her ‘replacement’
Australia-based Malawi Queens shooter Mwawi Kumwenda has discovered a towering netballer Ida Mhone from her home district Mzimba, whom she hopes will follow her footsteps in her netball career.
Mhone, who stands at 1.95 metres (m), taller than the 1.8m Mwawi, considered the tallest Malawian netballer, has been signed by Blantyre-based giants Kukoma Diamonds, the same team that groomed the Australia-based star.
The Melbourne Vixens star has been across the country, donating netball equipment to rural netball teams and inspiring players such as Mhone, said she believes the player has potential to play for the Malawi Queens.
“Meet future Malawi Queens Idah Mhone from Mzimba Boma,” Mwawi said on her Facebook Page.
The discovery of the player comes amid calls for Netball Association of Malawi (NAM) to start transition process for Malawi Queens, since the majority of players in the current squad are past their prime.
Though regarded as having vastly talented and skilful players, sixth-placed Malawi Queens have failed to break into the top-four dominated by England, Jamaica, New Zealand and Australia due to height challenges.
For close to 15 years, Malawi have relied on Kumwenda as the tallest player after former Malawi Queens’ Linda Magombo.
But analyst Patrick Zgambo said there are plenty of players of Idah’s calibre or even better, waiting to be nurtured.
“There are more. We must find them all and groom them. It takes years, but that is the way. This matter was hot during the 2023 Netball World Cup when we were all pulverised by the height factor and we almost felt genetically helpless and condemned that our team was old and too short on average.
“Our team needs to have a minimum six-year programme to evolve and have a variety of physical specimen, natural talent and acquired skills over programmes that run for years in order to get the results. It starts with spotting the naturally talented and those with the physical attributes that can be trained.”
In an interview, NAM general secretary Isaac Chimwala said the association has various programmes it is implementing to identify potential players with the right attributes.
“We have been identifying and monitoring a number of players across the country. We have identified so much talent through the ongoing Salima Sugar National Netball League,” he said.
Chimwala, however, said NAM plans to introduce the players in Under-17 and Under-20 national teams before they can gradually be promoted to the Queens.
“Taking these up-and-coming players directly into the Queens could be dangerous. We have had cases where such promising players were intimidated by senior players when we tried to integrate them into the Queens. Consequently, that affected their performance and the players lost interest in netball,” he said.
