adminEllina Mhlanga Sports Reporter
THE Rainbow Amateur Netball League have insisted they will not extend the season despite having some clubs that are still to complete their fixtures as the curtain came down on the 2019 season on Saturday.
Some of the clubs with outstanding matches had hoped for a grace period to fulfil the remaining games but it appears they will not have it their way.
RANL secretary-general Moses Gukurume yesterday said they need to be professional in the way they conduct their business and said they had the same problem last year.
“The way forward is if a team was supposed to travel, for example to Lusumbami and did not, the game will be awarded to Lusumbami. In the event that the hosting team is the one that prevented the other team to come and play, the match will be awarded to that team.
“So, it is depending on which is the offending team. For example, Mambas were asking to go to Hwange today (yesterday), their reason was they didn’t have proper transport, so points will be awarded to Lusumbami.
“We are not extending because if you look at it, costs are going up, we are now way over the budget we should have used. For example, travelling costs for umpires, it’s going up on a weekly basis, so we keep incurring costs because of matches that were supposed to have been completed. “Last year it happened but most of those teams collapsed. But this season it’s too much, we are saying going forward no games for the first round would be played in the second round because some of the games that have not been played were supposed to have been played in the first round,” said Gukurume.
Gukurume said there wasn’t official communication from the clubs on reasons why they postponed their matches except for Hwange-based Lusumbami.
“According to our rules and regulations, if they had genuine reasons they should have written to us. Most of the clubs did not except for Lusumbami they wrote to us asking to be assisted when they had challenges. The other teams just cancelled or postponed their matches without proper communication, meaning we don’t have any reason from the clubs stating why they could not fulfil their matches (as per the fixture).
“Communication is done officially and put to record to say we could not go or fulfil our game because of this. But we just heard clubs making their arrangements on their own and we just thought they would fulfil their games,” said Gukurume.
Recent weeks have seen clubs playing more games mid-week as they tried to catch-up. On Saturday, ZDF dismissed PPU 87-18. ZDF were coming from a defeat after they went down 37-49 to ZRP Mambas on Thursday.
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