For heaven's sake, just let the girls play

Valuable play time. . . Girls should enjoy playing netball and other sports without any hindrance.

When the Currie Cup final between Western Province and Sharks and the Soweto Derby between Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates hogged the headlines last week, a new sporting feat for South Africa happened with very little attention being paid to it. The national netball team, the Proteas, where in action in Port Elizabeth, in a series featuring Trinidad-and-Tobago and old nemesis England.

After losing 39-49 to England in an earlier match in the series, the Proteas on Friday brought the curtain down on the proceedings with a hard-fought 39-37 victory over England to clinch the tournament.

This was SA's first victory over highly ranked England in 14 years, and that the feat went unnoticed by most of the public clearly indicate the predicament netball and women's sports in general are facing in South Africa. This indicates the depth to which women's games have fallen, despite the netball series at the Nelson Mandela Bay University being covered live on SuperSport.

It was a commendable gesture by the channel, but their effort could not be accessed by the masses to whom the sport of netball belongs. This is the biggest female sport in the country and its activities should be pushed at all times onto the public domain through all media forms, including radio.

The series in Port Elizabeth, and the subsequent one, the Diamond Challenge, which features Zimbabwe and Zambia against a second-string Proteas side, are geared towards preparing the national team for the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics. The objective of this mission is not to afford SA the opportunity to qualify for the Olympics, but advance awareness and development ideals of netball in the country. So far, the progress of the Proteas and the development of the game at grassroots level are not in sync.

Netball will be making its Olympic debut in Rio de Janeiro, but this good news is generally unknown by the masses and it is also coming at the time netball is no longer visible in the communities.  I have not seen girls play netball in Tembisa or Standerton in recent times. All the venues where the game was played vigorously during my childhood are devoid of any action. 

The townships have become hostile to girls who want to pursue sport. Even a mere exercise of jogging is burdensome on girls and young women in the townships, thanks to nasty remarks and direct harassment from males. Boys are not absolved from this menace, as can be seen by the antagonistic bunch who have taken over the multi-sports courts outside the Mehlareng Stadium in Tembisa - just to hangout.

Judging by responses from colleagues, these chauvinistic behaviour prevails in other areas and has rendered girls in black communities a population with no access to sport. This calls for work to return netball and other sports to the people, more so women. The biggest effort in the community should involve men, including those in law enforcement, so that the girls can feel the appreciation and protection of their menfolk, in their effort to play sport in their own areas.

Unless this is done as a matter of urgency, the Olympic debut by netball in 2016 will remain unknown good news for girls and communities at large in South Africa, which a week later, still not privy to the victory of the Proteas over England.