By Neto Baptiste
For a second straight year, Antigua and Barbuda will not compete at the Jean Pierre Regional Under-16 Netball Tournament slated this year for April 3-10 in St Lucia.
Director of Sports Heather Samuel Daley confirmed that the players, who had reportedly been in training since October last year, have been informed of the decision, revealing that funding was one of the main issues.
“The ministry’s responsibility is to provide financial assistance as well as coaching or training and selecting of the team and we have done that or we were doing that. Obviously, there were some timelines to be met and unfortunately, the funding was not available at the time. There were some other issues and we met with the president of the association [Karen Joseph] and the ministry coaches and there was a final decision made,” she said.
Antigua and Barbuda missed the 2023 instalment of the tournament held in Dominica due to a “miscommunication” between the Ministry of Sports and the Antigua and Barbuda Netball Association (ABNA) which resulted in a training squad not being selected in time for the March 24 to April 1 event.
Daley said a new system within the treasury resulted in delays to request for funding which, in turn, caused them to miss several deadlines for payments to the organisers.
“For example, you have to pay for accommodation and referee and registration and so on, I think, since in January and those weren’t met. The deadline was extended and they still weren’t met. Obviously, you’d understand there is a new system in place at the treasury and so we just could not get the money, plain and simple,” the former national sprinter said.
Antigua and Barbuda competed in the 2019 instalment of the regional tournament when the country hosted the event at the YMCA Sports Complex.