During this project I am going to look at local and national provision for netball in the following areas: grass roots development, provision for/ pathways for elite performers, additional agencies and bodies, provision for disabled participants and the provision for male performers. Then at the end I will analyse all the above areas. The structure of England netball The All England Netball Association is the NGB they are in charge of everything to do with netball in England and is run by a board of directors. There are national committees below this; these are national committees are divided into 9 regions with 57 counties. There are 352 leagues in the counties, 26 of which are junior. There are 2,994 clubs that participate in these leagues and there are 74 youth college clubs and 2552 schools are involved with England Netball.
Grass Roots Development National-England netball has devised a scheme called active sports. The idea behind active sports is to develop young talent. Active sports is a 5 year development programme, which is coordinated England wide and delivered at a local level. The main provider of this is local clubs. Sport England funds this project. Active sports has 4 stages. Stage 1= local schemes, this is aimed at you people, who already know about netball, usually, through school. They target girls aged 10-11 who don’t belong to a club.
Stage 2= club development, this is where regular coaching is given for girls aged 11-16 who belong to clubs. Stage 3= assessment, this stage is about the best ways to asses how good players are who play at local clubs. Coaches and Teachers look for talented players and recommend them to higher levels when needed. Stage 4= development squads, the players selected in stage 3 are selected for academies which provided extra training. There are two types academies- Satellite academies; for girls aged 12-14, its locally based and involves 60 hours of support a week. The second is partnership academies- for girls aged 14-16 and involves fitness training and 80 hours of support per week.
Local- In my local area there is not that many grass roots schemes, but WOKSSA runs festivals for local primary using junior sports leaders from my school (encouraging coaching in young people) and hold tournaments for the primary schools. This gets children into the idea of netball and help to prepare them for more serious netball. This is similar to the first stage of the national scheme as most players are aged 10-11 and don’t belong to a club. Provision for the Elite This is the Pathway that www.englandnetball.com have on their website.
1. Satellite and county partnership academy- learning to train. 2. Regional talent programme- training to train 3. Talent 1 and 2 U17/U19 squads 4. TASS and super league + England U19/U21 5. National Squad- training to win National Stage 1-In each region there is a regional head scout (RHS) the RHS in my area is Denis Holland. The RHS is responsible for providing a performance standards workshop for teachers and coaches in the Kent area. They can nominate players who fit the criteria so they (the players) can go on the programme. A player must spend between 6 months and the 2 years at this stage.
Stage2-To get on this stage from the previous the player must be nominated by their county. They spend between 1 and 2 years at this stage. The players must attend the national screening day in March to reach the next stage. Stage3- There are about 20 players in these squads. These players receive training at the weekends from January to September
Stage4- players who play in the U17/U19 are automatically nominated as TASS athletes. This makes them part of the super league. The selection for national squads is done via the super league.
Stage5-You must be aged 16 or over to compete in the national squad. Local-My local sports partnership offers a FANS scheme, which provides opportunities for players who reach stage 4. This gives a lot of benefits such as small grants, discounts from physiotherapy in Kent, free use of facilities and a free personal coach. This scheme was established in Kent in 1998. This is an important plan in providing support for the county’s leading talented and elite performers.