Netball Tournament

To be completely honest, I’d never even heard of netball before coming to Malawi. That is before being told that I would be the Sports Mistress and in charge of our girl’s netball team. Fortunately the girls are fabulous players and require little in terms of skills coaching. I may not have known much about netball before, but I sure have learned a lot over the past few weeks!

We’d been holding netball and football (soccer) practices after school on Tuesdays and Thursdays and decided to enter our girl’s netball team into a tournament in Ntchisi District called the Presidential Cup. From what I’ve gathered, the President of Malawi is trying to encourage sports and after school activities throughout the country and has created these tournaments, prize money included in many areas.

We paid our affiliation fee of MK500 (~$3.57) and before we knew it were scheduled to play the very next weekend. This of course lead to some serious, every day, after school practices, though it’s difficult to keep students too late after school because they haven’t had time to go home for lunch.

After petitioning for funding, I was granted money from our school’s tiny budget to take 15 players by minibus to Ntchisi Boma, about 40km for the games this past Saturday. We also organized lunch, bringing two large buckets full of rice and beans which had been cooked the morning before.

We arrived at the field a few hours early and the girls were able to wander around the Boma, go to the market, visit friends and family, etc. I walked around with the two other teachers who had come to watch the games, Mr. Kaunda and the Sports Master, Mr. Gama.

Our first game was against another CDSS team called Mphere; my girls played really well but unfortunately lost by one basket. The best way I can think of to describe netball is to say it’s like basketball but without the dribbling, you have to keep passing the ball and can be penalized for taking steps without doing so. Like I said we lost by one basket, with a score of 12 to 11. I think had it not been our very first game, we definitely would have won. We’ll certainly beat Mphere next time we meet.

The second game started about an hour or so later and we faced a community team called the Ntchisi Police. The best way I can describe this team is to share with you what my girls said to me on the court a few minutes before the game. “Madame Kelly,” they said, “We can’t play this team. We’re afraid! They’re too big!” They weren’t worried for nothing; these women were not high school aged girls. They were big, muscular, well practiced players. I was equally afraid for my girls but told them not to worry and just to try their best.

They were absolutely awesome! I can’t even tell you how excited I was for them! I was keeping score on the sidelines, jumping and shouting “Inde!” (“Yes!”) throughout the entire game. They played so well! This was a seriously good team and I was so impressed by how skillfully my girls from Gwangwa were able to shoot, pass, and keep the ball away from them.

In the end, we lost the game but it doesn’t matter because we put up a really great fight. We’re scheduled to play in another game this weekend against an equally good team, but I think after another week of practice we should be able to play even better this coming Saturday. Who knows maybe we’ll even win!

Check out the pictures of my girls at the tournament. There aren’t many as I didn’t want to bring too much attention to myself and my other players on the sidelines by having a camera, but I think you’ll be able to get a feel for the court and players.