Territory juniors potentially miss out for second consecutive year as National Netball Championships cancelled

NETBALL Australia has made the call to cancel the 2021 National Netball Championships for the second consecutive year, with Territory juniors among many to miss out

Frustration for Emma Noblett and fellow NT netball stars as the National Netball Championships are cancelled. Picture: Glenn Campbell

NETBALL Australia has made the call to cancel the 2021 National Netball Championships for the second consecutive year, with Territory juniors among many to miss out.

The event was due to be held at Hobart Netball and Sports Centre from July 4-11 with the Territory under-19s and under-17s teams due to head to Tasmania on Friday.

The Championships provide emerging talent from across the country the opportunity to represent their state or territory against the best in their age groups in the country.

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Netball NT chief executive Ian Harkness said it was disappointing to see the championships cancelled for a second year though admitted the decision was inevitable.

“It is disappointing as this is the second year it has happened and for a number of these girls it’s the second time it’s happened to them personally,” Harkness said.

“They have been preparing since February for this and were due to head down on Friday so it is quite disheartening for the players and coaches.

“There will be a meeting later this month on the feasibility of moving the event to another date with the September holidays springing to mind though any date will carry risk.

“We know that any event has an element of risk and the circumstances across the country over the past week meant there really was no choice other than to cancel.”

Netball Australia executive general manager of performance Stacey West said it was a difficult but necessary decision to cancel the event.

“This is certainly not the position we hoped to be in, and we can only imagine the disappointment and frustration of our players, coaches and umpires,” West said.

“I’d like to thank Netball Tasmania, who have worked so hard to deliver an exceptional event experience, only to have the event cancelled for the second consecutive year.

“Unfortunately, the unpredictability and instability of the coronavirus pandemic isn’t going away and our priority is always the safety of our participants.”

Netball Australia will work with partner organisations such as Netball NT to explore options going forward in the rest of the tear to enable ongoing talent development.

The Darwin Netball League was unaffected by the outbreak with locdown coninciding with a bye week.