Despite being sure that the Confederation of Southern Africa Netball Associations (Cosana) Youth Championships will take place in Swaziland next month, Malawi Under-21 team will not start preparations to defend the title until organisers confirm actual dates of the event.
Netball Association of Malawi (NAM) president Rosy Chinunda on Wednesday said the team will not go into camp to avoid what they experienced last year when they spent over K4 million (about $10 000) on preparations, but learned at the eleventh hour that the contest had been cancelled.
The competition will be the Junior Queens’ chance to safeguard the last ounce of Malawi’s netball pride following rivals South Africa’s snatching of the African Netball Championship title from hosts Senior Malawi Queens in June this year.
South Africa also dethroned the Malawi Under-20 team on aggregate during the March 2012 Zone V1 Championships in Zambia.
“We are treading carefully on the preparations just in case the event gets cancelled again this year. We lost a lot of money last year when the contest was cancelled at the eleventh hour. We will only begin our groundwork once the organisers come to us and confirm the actual dates of the competition,” Chinunda said.
Cosana postponed and later cancelled the 2012 edition of the annual netball championships after some countries, including South Africa, Zambia and Botswana pulled out at the last minute.
Malawi Under-21 national team is still the defending champions after the tournament in Windhoek, Namibia in 2011. Then, the Junior Queens beat South Africa 36-26 in the finals.
