Covid-19 impacting netball, says Avei

COVID-19 has played a big part in affecting netball at the national level, says the sport’s national governing body.
Netball Papua New Guinea president Ulato Avei said the strict conditions in resuming competitions had forced the cancellation of the national championships for a second-straight year with plans to revamp the 2022 calendar.
“Covid-19 has really affected competitions and for last year and this year, there were no national championships,” she said.
“Each province will have one team and their focus will be on the junior competitions which are the Under-15s, 17s and 21s.
“That is the move now for Netball PNG.
“But unfortunately, Covid-19 has cut our plans short and we’re unable to run national competitions and tournaments.”
Avei said Netball PNG had received approval from the National Control Centre.
“Our main approval under Netball PNG has been granted and all associations run their tournaments,” she said.
“For each tournament to run, it must be the responsibility of the organisers to get the national pandemic response controller’s approval.
“We all have to work as partners and as part of Netball PNG’s aim to improve our communities.
“We see netball as a catalyst to improve gender equality.
“At the moment, we get very little or no funding from the Government, so we’re trying our best to involve our MPs to support their local associations.”