Netball Legend In for Suva Tourney
Former Silver Ferns captain Casey Kopua will be the chief guest at the 2019 Grasshoppers Netball Club Tournament. The 5th edition of the tournament is set for December 12-14 at the Vodafone Arena and National Netball Centre in Suva. Tournament Coordinator Alumeci Sachs said preparations are track as they look forward to hosting teams from Australia and New Zealand.
“The categories contested are Under 11, U13, U15, U17 and U21,” Sachs said
“This is actually the 5th year of hosting the tournament and we are grateful to Tourism Fiji for sponsoring this tournament alongside Holiday Inn as well who just have come on board recently.
“We have few other sponsors who have showed their interests in sponsoring the team.
“We are actually looking fielding in 40 teams in total for the competition.
“Our target is always age categories and most of our players come from Suva and Nausori areas. “Every year we usually get an Australian Diamond player as our special guest and this year we have Silver Ferns Kopua as our netball ambassador.
“An inner circle defender of outstanding quality, Kopua is a matchwinner and one of the game’s greatest defenders.
“The highly respected Kopua became the sixth Silver Fern to reach the 100-test milestone and has represented New Zealand at three Netball World Cups and three Commonwealth Games.
Advantages of tournament
“One of the advantages of hosting this tournament that we have seen is that there is a lot of networking and most of these players have managed to get scholarship opportunities overseas as well.
“We have a development programme also in placed for our club where we could see the impact it has on the level of skills for these young upcoming players.
“We are also creating a netball skill platform for our girls. And we are also expecting teams from Australia and New Zealand to take part in the competition as well.
“The Netball Skills programme teaches players the basic netball skills to develop their skills, make friends, enhance fitness and learn to love the game.”