Wits Internal Netball has new structure
The Wits Internal Netball League is calling all budding netball players to come register their teams in order to participate in the 2016 internal netball league.
The move, which was decided this week comes as a result of the desire of the internal league to grow.
“I love netball because it’s simple, it’s active and you’re less likely to get injuries than in rugby,” said 2015 Internal League chairperson and first team manager Klaas Mokgomole.
Mokgomole says it is important for the sport to grow in the university. Recruiting these new teams will ensure that there is a larger pool of players and more talent to choose from when the university needs to be represented externally.
“The new structure is aimed at enhancing competition and making sure teams don’t quit,” Mokgomole said.
The new structure of the internal league is that it will now consist of 20 teams in total; 10 of which were top 10 in last year’s league. The teams will be divided into pools A and B respectively, based on their performance in the upcoming season.
Mokgomole says in the past netball was not given the necessary recognition in the past. “I believe it will be recognised this year because the Wits girls won USSA 2015 Championships in Pool B … so netball is in the spotlight” he says.
The pools will function as a kind of a league structure, with Pool A being the “premier league” and Pool B being the first division.
By the end of the season, the bottom three teams in Pool A will be relegated to Pool B and the top three teams in Pool B will be promoted to Pool A.
Pool B, will play their matches on Tuesdays and Pool A will play their matches on Thursdays.
New teams have till February 26, to register. Internal teams will be charged R800 to be part of the league, while external teams will be charged R 1 000 per team.
While players that are not students of the university will be allowed to participate, there are conditions. “You can get any student from any institution and register them in your team as externals … teams that register as externals will be forced to have a minimum of six Wits players. The maximum number of players a team can register is 10-15,” says Mokgomole.
With teams that are internal, they can have a minimum of two Wits players. Clubs and societies as well as schools are also invited to participate in the league.
