Talent scouting funds diverted
Northern Region Netball Committee) has missed today’s deadline which Netball Association of Malawi (NAM) set for regions to identify players for national team trials after diverting K1.5 million for the exercise to a recent Under-19 bonanza.
The committee’s chairperson Tamara Fweta has since requested NAM to extend the deadline to February 4, the day the committee has planned to conduct the regional trials at Katoto Netball Court in Mzuzu.
On the other hand, the Southern and Central regional netball committees already identified 35 representatives each for the national trials scheduled between February 9 and 11 in Lilongwe.
A total of 90 players, 30 from each of the country’s three regions, plus those in the current national squad will undergo national trials to identify 40 players that will form Malawi Queens’ A and B teams ahead of the Netball World Cup in South Africa in July.
Said Fweta: “We hurriedly used our funding for a recent Under-19 bonanza, whose target was to identify tall players. This also gave our players an opportunity to be active after staying for a long time without playing games due to scarcity of sponsored events.
“However, after understanding NAM’s wish for us to send a strong team to the national trials, we have now requested the association to extend the deadline.”
NAM vice-president Chimwemwe Bakali has since accepted the committee’s request, but has told the committee to find own means of sourcing funds for the exercise.
“We have accepted to give them grace period because their claim is well-understood. However, they have to look for own funding for the trials. All we want from them is to give us names of 30 players by February 4,” he said.
Asked where they will get funding for the trials after exhausting their allocation, Fweta said: “As a committee, we have agreed to contribute a little something and we are appealing for support from well-wishers.”
Over 70 players attended the trials in the South. The Centre attracted over 60 players.
At the Netball World Cup, which will take place on African soil for the first time, the world’s sixth-ranked Queens are in Group B alongside third-ranked England, 10th-placed Scotland and 14th-ranked Barbados.
Group A has Australia, Zimbabwe, Fiji and Tonga while hosts South Africa will take on Jamaica, Wales and Sri Lanka in Group C. Reigning champions New Zealand are in Group D, which also has Uganda, Singapore and Trinidad & Tobago.
The Queens have not been active since August last year when they competed in the Netball World Cup qualifiers in South Africa where they finished second after going down 60-44 to the hosts.
They could not travel to South Africa for the recent SPAR Challenge as NAM could not source the required K80 million.
