2016 Centre Stage
Hurunui Netball Centre
Our Centre is made up of 6 clubs from the Hurunui region of North Canterbury. We are the most geographically spread centre in New Zealand with teams from Glenmark, Cheviot, Waiau, Hanmer Springs, Culverden and Hawarden all competing in their respective grades.
What makes us unique is that each week we all travel to a different Club to play our games. Each Club will have a minimum of two home games during the season and this is an opportunity for individual clubs to fundraise in the form of holding sausage sizzles, raffles and tuck shops etc.
Coaching workshops were held by Jen Hooper, from Netball Mainland, at the start of the season to assist coaches and parents and this was of great interest to many of our coaches. We look forward to continuing to run these workshops again in the coming years.
The 2016 season has started well with a total of 34 teams playing in the Senior and Primary competitions this year. Competition rounds are into their third week and there have been some tight games already across all grades. The second round starts the 25th June with finals day being held in Hanmer on Saturday 20th August.
The hotly contested games between Kaikoura and Hurunui grade winners and will be hosted this year by Kaikoura on Saturday 27th August.
ANZ futureFERNS
We have introduced the new ANZ Year 5 & 6 programme this year as well as continuing the ANZ futureFERNS Year 3 & 4 programme. The players are all benefiting from these skills focussed programmes, showing increased skill levels across the court.
Due to the geographical diverseness of our Centre we run the futureFERN programmes in conjunction with our Saturday competition, this means that our young players get to see other teams playing which inspire them to continue to play and extend themselves.
A highlight for our younger players from previous years has been the running of a mini tournament where a shortened game is played and we have carried this on in 2016 with a midyear tournament to reinforce the skills learnt over the first 5 weeks and an end of year tournament where players can demonstrate all the skills that they have learnt this season.
Umpiring
This year we have a number of players completing workshops and being observed to gain their respective certificate of umpiring from Junior through to Senior level. Congratulations goes to Rebecca Murdoch, Hurunui’s Umpire Coordinator for her recent success in the passing of her Zone Theory test enabling her to umpire Premier Grades.
Representative Netball
After a successful 2015 season for our Senior representative team we are looking forward to see the calibre of this years’ teams. Selections are currently under way for the following teams; - Senior, U17, U15, Primary A and B teams which will compete at the following events…..
Hurunui vs Kaikoura and Marlborough Invitational at Kaikoura 19th June
Country Centres Field Day at Lincoln 24th July
Primary A team to compete at Mid Canty Junior Tournament at Ashburton 7th August
Hurunui vs Malvern and Kaikoura at Hurunui 14th August
Hurunui Senior and Primary A vs North Canterbury at Ohoka 21st August
The Hurunui Netball Centre wishes all other netball Centres the best for a successful season and look forward to meeting some of you on the court throughout the season.
