21 Nov 2023

With less than 10 days remaining before the Africa Netball Cup 2023, which will be hosted in Botswana from November 28 to December 6, Team Botswana is yet to move to camp.

This was confirmed by Botswana Netball Association (BONA) spokesperson, Mokereste Mokereste.

He said due to financial constraints, the players only meet at training.

He said currently they only had P140 000, adding it was not enough to lodge Team Botswana, both the women’s and the men’s sides.

According to Mokereste both teams were scheduled to report for camp on Monday, but the association did not have enough funds to accommodate them.

“We are talking about their daily camp allowances, food, transport, competition allowance and accommodation,” he said.

“Our biggest challenge is that we have the men’s team and it has never been included in the actual budget.”

He stated that BONA had received grant that had to be shared between the two teams.

Mokereste assured that despite the financial challenge, Team Botswana continued with daily training, adding that he was happy with the commitment of the players during training.

He appealed to any sponsor that was in a position to assist to step forward so that the team could go into camp, which had a lot of advantages since it kept the players in the same environment and they would have ample time to bond as a team.

In other issues, Mokereste said he was happy that the games would be using a sprung floor and therefore the tournament would be used as rankings.

In the women’s category, Burundi, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, Uganda, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe have confirmed their participation.

In the men’s side the guests are South Africa, Uganda, Kenya, Zambia and Zimbabwe. ENDS