Antigua and Barbuda will seek to become one of two countries to qualify for next year’s Netball World Cup when they compete in the October 15-22 Netball World Cup Qualifier for the Americas Region slated for the NCB Wellness and Recreation Centre in Kingston, Jamaica.
The Antigua and Barbuda senior team will join teams from eight other countries, including hosts Jamaica who have already qualified for the July 28 to August 6, 2023 Netball World Cup in Cape Town, South Africa.
The other countries already confirmed for the qualifiers are Barbados, Cayman Islands, Grenada, St Lucia, St Vincent and The Grenadines, Trinidad & Tobago and the USA.
Netball Jamaica launched the Netball World Cup Qualifier for the Americas Region last week with Olivia ‘Babsy’ Grange, Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sports as the patron for the qualifier.
She congratulated Netball Jamaica for taking the bold step to host the qualifier and promised to help in every way possible to make the event a success. She committed 12 million Jamaica dollars ($12,000,000) from the government to Netball Jamaica to help cover the cost of staging the qualifier.
Netball Jamaica president Tricia Robinson welcomed the opportunity to host the event which has never been held in Jamaica prior to this up-coming qualifier. She promised that the series will be a very exciting one and that there will be high level competition among the region’s teams. She encouraged everyone to come to the matches and show their support for all the teams while they ‘mek noise’ for the Sunshine Girls who have been preparing for competition. Additionally, she thanked all the sponsors who have come on-board so far to ensure that the qualifier is a financial success.
Marva Bernard, president of the Americas Region promised that the regional governing body stands ready to support Netball Jamaica who was awarded the qualifier about two year ago. She said that she expects some very competitive match-ups among the countries in her region and that the qualifier can only help to improve netball in the region.