National netball team seeks sponsor

National netball team seeks sponsor Namibia's senior national netball team is looking for a dedicated sponsor for the team upon their return to the International Netball Federation (INF) ranking system after competing in the Africa Senior National Netball Championship in Kampala, Uganda, recently.

The team had not taken part in any international or friendly tournaments for the last three years due to lack of finances. This has resulted in them dropping on the ranking and sitting at 37th spot out of 38.

The secretary-general of Netball Namibia, and an active netball player for Tigers, Imelda Nerongo, said they were pleased to return to the INF ranking system, but the hard work was just starting if they were to remain in the rankings.

Nerongo said some companies did not see the bigger picture and thus did not see the need to sponsor a national team. “Sponsorship can also be in the form of paying for our accommodation, meals and transport whenever we have to participate in games,” she said.

She explained that getting a dedicated sponsor would enable them to host international games here in Namibia, “where we can invite other big teams or our neighbouring teams more regularly”.

“A dedicated sponsor would also help the team to participate in international friendlies abroad, as there are regular invitations to ranking games abroad.”

She said their approach now was to host international friendlies this year and early next year.

“We receive some money from the government but if they have nothing in their coffers we suffer, but us competing in ranking games is for this nation,” Nerongo explained.

A sponsor would help the national team's ranking and allow the players to play continuously, which in turn would help them improve their game as a team.

Going forward, they also plan to host competitions ranked by the INF. “We can be ranked number three in Africa in a short period of time and we can move to at least number 25 on the INF table,” she said.

- Additional reporting by Nampa