Netball Boss Pleased After 10-Year Hiatus

President of the Antigua and Barbuda Netball Association (ABNA) and former national player, Karen Joseph is heartened by the support the game has received since the reintroduction of a national league this year.
The sport, which has been dormant for about 10 years, played its first official league match in March of this year, after going dormant from a competitions standpoint in 2008.
Joseph is however pleased with what she has seen thus far.
“When I see people start coming back to the YMCA to watch netball, it’s a joy. People on the stands making noise; but as netballers we just need to work together. We are struggling in terms of our umpiring because we don’t have any first-class umpires here, but those we have, we have to work with. Sometimes we have issues with teams and officials and so on but we just need to work together, because at the end of the day it’s about getting netball back to where it used to be,” she said. 
Teams are competing across four divisions, A, B, C and Mixed, in a two-round competition at the YMCA Sports Complex.
The standard, Joseph said, is not too shabby.
“I have seen some top netball in the league and I have seen the fighting spirit so you can see they are eager to get back into the competition. The style of play, even though, from what we are seeing here, it is a little behind, I can see we can have a good showing for the under-23 [OECS qualifiers] and the national teams,” the former goal shoot said.
Matches in the competition are played on Saturdays, Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays at the YMCA facility.